Tony Windsor (New England, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

Before addressing the Health Insurance Amendment (Medicare Dental Services) Bill 2007, I wish the member for Makin the very best for the future. Obviously, she has made in this parliament a great contribution to public life.

The bill that is before the House today is about a very important issue, dental health, and makes modifications to the Medicare legislation. I bring to this debate a petition that has been initiated in my electorate but has been taken up in other electorates. It relates to the provision of dental care as part of the Medicare process.

One of the things that have struck me about oral health, particularly during a period of time when the economy has seen massive surpluses from the budgetary process, is that essentially dental care has been neglected. Whether we like the blame game or not, we should review this issue, which concerns the state provision of dental care services to our constituents, who are members of the Australian public. The Prime Minister has made a number of comments recently about the performance of the states and he has made moves about this in Tasmania, and in the parliament he has endorsed moves over the local government initiatives in Queensland and the legislation for Aborigines in the Northern Territory, which is another one of the issues. So there have been a number of questions posed by the Commonwealth about responsibilities that have previously been those of the states.

Rather than get into the issue of who is at fault here and into the two competing policy approaches that we spent most of today’s question time on and which we also discussed in the matters of public importance debate today, I would rather encourage both sides of the parliament to do what should be done on oral health. Oral health has been the responsibility of the states for many years other than during that period of time when the Keating Labor government initiated an assistance package for the states. There was debate today about whether it was axed or terminated but I do not want to go into that at this particular point in time. I think the important thing is that Medicare has evolved over a period of time and that process has not really included oral health, other than through the arrangements that have been put in place in recent years whereby people with chronic diseases have references from their medical practitioners that they need additional assistance. Even today’s legislation refers to the fact that it is only by references for people having a chronic illness, a process that involves patients’ medical practitioners, that people can access the Medicare arrangements. So even though I will be supporting this legislation, I see it as not going far enough to deal with the total problem.

It is not good enough for both sides of a parliament of a developed nation in the economic shape that we are in—and I congratulate the government for its efforts as to some of the budgetary measures that have taken place and for the massive surplus that is there now—to just accept that some tinkering at the edges of oral health is in fact good enough. We need to include oral health in with all other bodily health. Irrespective of whether it has been a constitutional anomaly or an arrangement between the states and the Commonwealth as to who has been responsible in the past, we are living in a new century and to leave oral health out of all other bodily health functions in the Medicare arrangements is, in my view, an absolute disgrace. It is disgraceful that in a developed nation of this size 650,000 Australians are not having their teeth looked after adequately!

If we leave this parliament—and there are people leaving this parliament as they are giving their final speeches—quite comfortable that 650,000 Australians, in a nation that has had enormous growth and prosperity in recent years, cannot have basic dental care treatment provided under our health system, that is an absolute disgrace. As I said, I will be supporting the bill before the House because it does raise the bar slightly, but when you are coming from a very low base to start with a slight rise really does not achieve much at all. I will be watching very closely to see what the Labor Party does on this issue.

If there were ever a need to spend money on the provision of a basic government service, surely this would be it. It is a great shame on all of us to see people in Australia—people who have worked hard for Australia, people on pensions, young people, middle-aged people and old people—quite deliberately not eating some particular foods and quite deliberately not going to the dentist because they cannot afford it. To say that we are a greatly developed nation while we have that shame sitting there is a disgrace. Irrespective of the cost, that should be the function of government. We have spent the last decade or two removing government from various functions, but if the major function of government is not to provide basic health services to the constituency I do not know what is. It is always No. 1 on an election platform. But I do not see this particular piece of legislation addressing it, because it still revolves around a process involving medical practitioners and chronic illness for people to have access to basic dental care.

There are reasons that we are given from time to time as to why it cannot be included, and one reason is that it will be a massive cost; it will cost billions of dollars to achieve. But today we are talking about health insurance and the Medicare arrangements, and a dollar a week from every Australian would raise a billion dollars in a year. I would have thought that that sort of magnitude of spending, given the massive surpluses that have been in the budgetary processes for some years, would be quite small to actually address this issue over a period of time—a very basic issue of dental care as part of our health system. To suggest that that is not part of our responsibility in this place, because it is something that the states have looked after for some years, is wrong. Obviously, they have been incompetent or they cannot afford it. But if we are in an era when the Commonwealth can interfere where it sees a need, there is no greater need in terms of the delivery of health care, in my view, than basic oral health. Oral health, and there are a number of doctors in this place, and I am pleased to see there is one here now—

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