Bob Baldwin (Paterson, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Tourism) Share this | Hansard source

I support the motion by the shadow minister of health, the member for Dickson, that the Health Insurance (Dental services) Amendment Determination 2012 (No. 1), dated 3 September 2012, made under subsection 3C(1) of the Health Insurance Act 1973, be disallowed. I support the shadow minister because I support those in my community. Yesterday in this House I highlighted but three of the cases brought to me by my constituents.

What I find most appalling in this argument by the Minister for Health is that she claims that the services are there to be driven for and supported by the millionaires in our community. I have to tell the minister that there are not too many millionaires living in my electorate. My electorate is made up largely of aged people, with 21 per cent of my population being over 65. I have a very high demographic of low-income earners throughout my electorate. That is reflected in the government's own figures, which show that 80 per cent of the people who have accessed the Medicare Chronic Disease Dental Scheme are concession card holders.

In discussions this morning with one of my GPs—people who obviously you do not trust to make informed decisions about chronic disease—he said to me that the cost of providing this service, as against doing nothing and the hospitalisation of those people because of their chronic condition, is a cheap fix. In fact, while there is $4,250 allowed over two years to address the dental condition of those suffering from these chronic diseases, the average cost claim is less than $1,800 over the two years. In fact, the around one million people that have been treated have had 20 million services. Today, Minister, in an article reporting your response to my story in the Maitland Mercury yesterday, you said—

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