Steve Georganas (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

We heard the shadow minister for health say earlier that, in the last decade, we have seen state governments drive down dental care. That is because the coalition cut the Commonwealth dental scheme, and waiting lists went up to 750,000 people. People were waiting up to four years to get their teeth fixed.

As I said yesterday, I am always happy to take advice from anyone, but I am not sure whether any advice from the opposition should be taken seriously, with their record. Now they come into this House and talk to us about dental care and what should be done for people who have illnesses who are on low incomes et cetera. Where was this passion about dental care when they were in government and we would raise this constantly? There was a brick wall when we would raise it, for a whole decade. We all remember that. Every single one of us on this side remembers. I urge you to look at the Hansard, at the questions I asked and the questions that the member for Richmond and the member for Shortland asked. They were passionate about dental care. In opposition, there were lots of debates and lots of talk but there was constantly a brick wall put up, with the government saying: 'It has absolutely nothing to do with us. Go to your mates in the state Labor governments. It's their responsibility. We wipe our hands of it.' In 2007, as the clock was ticking over towards the federal election, the coalition came up with a scheme that was cobbled together and was meant to cost $90 million a year. We see it now costing $1 billion a year, approximately $80 million per month, with people still on that waiting list. It is doing nothing for those people.

On this side of the House, we are very proud of this bill. This is something that we have all campaigned on. It was an election promise in 2007 and 2010, and it is now coming to fruition. It is very important that those opposite support it. We were elected on this platform in 2007 and 2010. We have a mandate. It is very clear. On two occasions when we have tried to progress dental reform in this House, it has been blocked by those opposite—not once but twice. As I said, we have a clear mandate. It cannot be any clearer. We have the electoral authority to deliver this reform of the provision of dental services in this land. If you look at the Hansard from when we were in opposition, and from since we have been in government, you will see the commitments that we have made. We are delivering on those commitments. We want to deliver a dental scheme that is equitable for all in this nation. That is what this bill does.

I do not believe the opposition will support this bill, because that is all we have heard from them—a constant no, no, no, on every bit of reform that we try to put into this place. By opposing this bill, they are opposing the most vulnerable in our community—pensioners, children and low-income earners who have no other way of getting their teeth fixed and maintained. We have another fear campaign from those opposite, saying that we are cutting the Chronic Disease Dental Scheme and there will be no services for the people on that scheme. We are offering a service to people with chronic diseases and to people on low incomes. People on low incomes who have no other means to pay for dental care will get the services that they require. This is an Abbott scare campaign, just as we have seen with the carbon tax and a whole range of other things. It is a scare campaign trying to convince people that we are going to deprive them of dental services—when we have campaigned continually for 10 years on the fact that we believe in a dental system that assists pensioners and people on low incomes to receive the services that they require.

They are preaching now to us about dental care, but when they came in and axed the Commonwealth dental scheme people were required to wait up to two and three years. At one stage, the lists of people waiting to have their teeth fixed ballooned out to 750,000. Labor have promised, and we have been pursuing, something very different to those opposite, and that is to increase the availability of dental services. The poorly designed coalition scheme, which we have sought for years to replace, subsidised treatment of millionaires. Gina Rinehart could get access to that scheme, yet a pensioner in my electorate, in Plympton, who did not have a chronic disease but had worked all her life, paid her taxes and was now on an age pension, could not access it. You tell me where the equity and fairness is in that.

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