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House of Assembly - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2008-11-13 Daily Xml
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COMMONWEALTH DENTAL PROGRAM

Mr O'BRIEN (Napier) (15:14): I rise to call upon the federal senators representing South Australia to support the South Australian dental system. The Rudd government has attempted to reintroduce the commonwealth dental health program, which was entered into by the Howard government in 1996. The program was designed to reduce the waiting list across the country, which currently stands at 650,000. Coupled with the Medicare Teen Dental Plan, which will provide dental care for our children previously not available, the Rudd government's investment in dental health would have been around $780 million.

The commonwealth dental health program would inject $24.7 million into the South Australian dental health system over three years. The program is projected to provide 1,900 visits for indigenous people in addition to 3,100 visits for preschool children in South Australia. Importantly, the program is expected to provide 3,000 visits for chronic disease-related cases.

As the program extends, those who carry adult concession cards will be eligible for regular checkups and routine preventative dental care. Overall, an extra 85,000 dental visits over three years would be provided to South Australians as a result of this additional funding. Under the former Howard government's chronic disease dental scheme, South Australians received only $2.5 million in funding, representing about 2.8 per cent of the national share of the program. This resulted in only 1,256 people with chronic disease in our state benefiting from the program.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! The member for Napier will pause a minute. I advise the camera operator in the gallery that the condition under which you are allowed to operate is that you focus only on the person on their feet. It has been drawn to my attention that the camera is moving widely. You may not film anyone other than the person on their feet. The member for Napier.

Mr O'BRIEN: Given the need for increased access to more effective dental care for pensioners and low income earners, the vote to reject the Rudd government's commonwealth dental program by the Liberals, Greens and Nick Xenophon in the Senate will, in effect, deny our public dental system of funding to the tune of $24.7 million over three years.

Dental waiting lists in South Australia reached the lofty heights of 49 months under the previous state Liberal government. The Rann Labor government, by investing an additional $56 million into the public dental services sector, has managed to reduce the waiting time to around 18 months. Had the Rudd government's dental program not been rejected by the likes of Senator Nick Xenophon, the waiting list would have fallen further to around 11 months.

The argument put forward by Nick Xenophon during the debate in the Senate favoured the retention of the chronic disease scheme in addition to establishing the commonwealth dental program. However, the chronic disease scheme was ill-defined and economically irresponsible, given its potential to provide unnecessarily expensive, high-end treatment to the cost of $4,000 per patient. The package did not differentiate between the wealthy and the underprivileged, and did not concentrate on preventative care which could provide far greater value for tax dollars.

While demanding that the chronic disease dental program be retained, Senator Xenophon clearly acknowledged in the Senate the failure of the same program when he stated:

I note that the previous scheme was poorly accessed in most states with my home state of South Australia receiving only 2.8 per cent of funding.

He then went on to acknowledge:

I see benefit in the proposed new dental scheme that the government wants to implement, and that will be a good thing for South Australians.

Yet, Senator Xenophon voted against the Rudd government's dental program.

The Senate was established to ensure that the interests of smaller states were protected. Senator Xenophon has failed his constituents by denying South Australia the delivery of a better dental health care program. The importance of providing a solid dental program, which focuses on preventative treatment, is evidenced by statistics suggesting that Australia is ranked third to last in the 29 OECD countries for oral health among 35 to 45 year olds. That is primarily due to the non-affordability of private dental care compounded by the difficulty in accessing the overwhelmed public dental health service.

The Rudd government's dental health program would improve access to dental health care, including those with chronic disease, but, more importantly, it would provide greater support for those with health concession cards. I call on the opposition, the Greens and Nick Xenophon in the Senate to reconsider their position on this issue.

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