Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Health and Ageing) Share this | Hansard source

Let me put on the record that—and this is certainly the department's and the public's view of this minister—incompetence reigns supreme in this minister's office. This minister may claim to sit around in Canberra cafes for most of her time when she is here in the ACT. But, Minister, I can tell you that when you talk to stakeholders, to dentists and to these cancer patients, you are condemned as incompetent. You are condemned because you will never preside over a scheme that provides support to patients, and to sick children whose parents are living in despair at the moment. You are condemned because these people have looked to you for support and in their hour of need you have surrendered them, as have Mr Windsor and Mr Oakeshott, who are complicit in this dreadful policy.

I say to the parliament and to the Australian people, if you want a demonstration of the government's incompetence, if you want to look at the way this government operates, you need look no further than their operation in the area of health. It is not just restricted to the area of pink batts, where they cannot get a policy right and they waste money; to school halls, where they have wasted billions of dollars; to the solar panels; or to the management of the carbon tax implementation. This is a government that cannot get the basic requirements right. The government's basic charge is to take care of its people. The government's basic charge is to protect its people. This government is hanging out to dry, for a period of 19 months, the most vulnerable people in our country. Cancer patients and people suffering from chronic diseases are being told by their GPs that, yes, under Tony Abbot's scheme for the last five years they had support and relief from the most severe pain that could be imagined but now, for crass political purposes, this government seeks to destroy the scheme, to hang these people out to dry for an extended period of time—not because their scheme is about to start tomorrow but because they want to drive Tony Abbott's scheme into the ground and discredit it, on unreliable grounds.

I ask this minister: what future is there for the 800,000 people who use this scheme? What future is there for people who have accessed this scheme, 80 per cent of whom have been on concession cards, and the most of the remainder of whom have been on relatively low incomes? What future is there for those people and people in like situations over the next 19 months?

If the minister refuses to answer, let me provide this understanding. The fact is that those people will not access services going forward. Even from 1 July 2014—in 19 months time—they will not be accessing $4,250 worth of dental services, as they have received under Tony Abbott's scheme. They will be receiving a maximum of $1,000—that is what is provided under the government's scheme. And they say that somehow that is superior to what the Abbott scheme provided.

This is a government dominated by spin, and drowning in its own spin. This is a government that does not have the capacity to look those people in the eye. The member for New England, who has come into the chamber now, needs to look his constituents in the eye and tell them why it was that he signed up to this plan, that he would not enter into negotiations, not enter into discussions, about some sort of compromise arrangement. It is incumbent on this minister, and these Independents, to say why they are supporting what is a failed process.

The minister can go over there and jest and laugh with the member for New England, but the member for New England should know that his constituents—those people who are suffering from chronic diseases in his electorate right now—are watching and listening to this debate and saying to the member for New England, 'Why are you not, Mr Windsor, standing up for us as your most worthy constituents?' The member for New England and the member for Lyne, why are you not prepared for your constituents?

The capacity now for this disallowance to proceed rests in the hands of Mr Windsor and Mr Oakeshott. If they want to do something for people who are going to be left high and dry for 19 months, they should come to some compromise, talk to us about a position whereby we could provide support to those most in need over the 19 months. If you want to provide support to the government's scheme for a start date of 1 July, that is an issue for you. If you are happy with the design and you think it is going to be an appropriate and efficient spend of money, then that is an issue for you, and I am happy for you to make that decision.

But what about these people over the next 19 months who will not have the same access that they are getting under the Chronic Disease Dental Scheme? And don't stand up here and say that they will receive assistance under the public scheme, because they will not; that is a falsehood. Those people who are able to receive treatment today, to turn up and go in and see their GP, would, under Tony Abbott's scheme, have been referred immediately to a dentist and received that $4,000 worth of treatment over a two-year period. That is not going to happen into the future under what the government is proposing and what the Independents are supporting in this arrangement, and that needs to be put on the record. And it needs to be addressed, because if these people are just going to blindly follow a bad government, then people are going to suffer in their constituencies.

This is an explanation that must be made by the Independents and by the government. They must say to those people who can get access under the Chronic Disease Dental Scheme that they are not going to get access over the next 19 months—look them in the eye and say that. That is the failure that is before the House today, and it is up to the Independents to support this motion to stop bad policy. (Time expired)

See this speech in context