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

Let me say in all frankness that the allied health professionals scheme in respect of dentistry that was put in place early in 2004 has not worked as well as the government wanted it to, and that is why the government has completely restructured the scheme. The problem with the scheme that we put in place in 2004 was not the referral system. The referral system works perfectly well now that doctors have got used to it. For allied health professional consultations for people on team care plans, it works perfectly well. In the last financial year 400,000 people were put on team care plans. Those doctors did not have a problem with establishing which of their patients had chronic disease and complex care needs. Those doctors did not have a problem. Those patients were perfectly qualified for assistance under Medicare. There were one million allied health professional consultations under these team care plans. Those allied health professionals did not have a problem with the paperwork. So, if the doctors do not have a problem with the referral process and if the allied health professionals do not have a problem with the paperwork in respect of all other conditions, there is no reason to think that there is going to be an insuperable problem in respect of dentistry.

No, the problem in respect of dentistry was that the scheme as it has operated just covered consultations. People with poor oral health do not want a consultation; they want to treatment, for God’s sake! And do you know what Labor are going to give them? Consultations! Useless consultations, not the treatment that they need. That is why our scheme is so good and that is why it is so sad, not so much for the people who need this treatment, because this legislation will pass the parliament, but for the credibility of the shadow minister opposite. Just like the former Leader of the Opposition voting against tax cuts, she is voting against $385 million worth of dental treatment for people who really need it.

Who is going to get dental treatment under this scheme? People with chronic disease and contributing poor oral health. There are about a million Australians with diabetes, there are a lot more than that who have heart disease, there are hundreds of thousands of people who have cancer and there are tens of thousands of people who have serious mental health problems. All of those people are potentially eligible for this scheme. Does the shadow minister opposite seriously believe that none of the 700,000 people for whom GP care plans were established in the last financial year has serious oral health problems? Is that really what she is saying? The fact is that many of them do, and they will be eligible, or potentially eligible, for help under this excellent scheme which is going through the parliament as we speak.

Let us be absolutely clear about the political folly. I see the shadow minister is getting a bit more trauma counselling from her predecessor, the former shadow minister for health, the member for Lalor. I am afraid the author of Medicare Gold is not going to be able to give too much good advice to the author of the current policy turkey from the Australian Labor Party.

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