Greg Combet (Charlton, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Procurement) Share this | Hansard source

The states doubled their funding, in fact. In 2004 the Howard government belatedly attempted to address their failure in this area by making dental care available through Medicare, but only to people with chronic illnesses and complex care needs. However, I think it is now well recognised that the scheme introduced in 2004 was riddled with problems—including complex and restrictive eligibility criteria, high out-of-pocket costs and somewhat complex referral processes from GPs for people to be able to access the entitlement under the scheme.

As a result the scheme only assisted about 7,000 people over a three-year period, in a context where we have 650,000 on a waiting list. I do not think that can be characterised as a success in public policy terms. So the Rudd Labor government has made an important start in trying to address this important area of public health, where I think, as a nation, we have been failing people in the community. For these reasons I commend the bills to the House.

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