Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Hansard source

It is an honour to follow the new Minister for Ageing. The Leader of the Opposition will have to be a lot better at scripting muck-raking questions if he is going to trip up this good new minister.

I do thank the member for Macquarie for his question and I can inform him that this government supports oral health in a number of ways: first of all, through PBS subsidy of prescriptions written by dentists; secondly, through modest—and I do stress ‘modest’—Medicare support for dental treatment under team care plans prepared by GPs; thirdly, through increasing dental training places from 221 commencements in 1995 to 312 commencements in 2005, to a planned 561 commencements in 2010. But, most importantly, the government supports oral health through subsidising the 90 per cent of dental services that take place in the private sector to the tune of about $400 million a year.

I certainly regret, as all members of this House do, that there are an estimated 650,000 people on public dental waiting lists. But the blame lies fairly and squarely at the feet of the state Labor governments, which have consistently failed to deliver timely public dental treatment. Members opposite from the great state of New South Wales should be ashamed that there are 210,000 people on New South Wales public dental waiting lists because the Carr-Iemma government has consistently short-changed dental services in that state.

At the Westmead dental hospital, patients with no teeth of their own and with no false teeth are supposed to be treated within three months. That is bad enough, but thanks to the neglect of the Carr-Iemma government those poor people with no teeth whatsoever are now waiting nearly 2½ years for public dental treatment. Patients in severe pain are supposed to be treated within five days. That is bad enough, but thanks to the mismanagement of the Carr-Iemma government those patients now have to wait in severe pain for up to three weeks before they get public dental treatment.

It is very clear where the blame should lie: the blame should lie with the consistent underfunding and the consistent short-changing of the Carr-Iemma government, which spends 25 per cent less on public dentistry per head than the next stingiest state in Australia.

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