Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

were without any access to effective public dental care over years and years and years, going back to the cruel decision in 1996 to axe that program, leaving so many people in the lurch. Frankly, it is breathtaking that the Liberal Party could put forward a question on this.

We have committed ourselves to re-establishing the Commonwealth dental program. We have committed ourselves to establishing a new teen dental program, which will assist teenagers to obtain a $150 subsidy effectively each year to assist them with getting a proper dental check each year. Why? Because dental health is fundamental to total health—something which those opposite when they were in government seemed not to grasp.

When it comes to the overall structure of our dental programs, we take the needs of working families seriously. That is why we have restructured programs we inherited from the previous government which, on balance, were not being effective, and have introduced instead a series of additional health programs targeted at working families, targeted at those who need public dental care and targeted at those who need teen dental care. We stand by the commitments we made before the election and will honour each one in full.

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