Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

The arrogance and, more, the hypocrisy that the opposition have now outlined in their opposition to the teen dental program are really breathtaking. Even more breathtaking is the position that they are now advocating where they say they are taking a responsible course of action in respect of this disallowance motion. It is not a responsible position they are adopting at all. It was a matter that was clearly put before the Australian public prior to the last election, where the choice was stark. It was the choice for the future of Mr Rudd, the Prime Minister, or the opposition, who were out of touch and had completely lost their way. The public made their choice. They made it on the election commitments that the Rudd government put forward. This program was one of the central planks that the Rudd government put forward.

The opposition had their program on the plate. Their program did not meet the test. It did not win; it was a failed scheme, which they need to recognise and accept. Look at the hypocrisy that the opposition now try to confuse us with, when they say, ‘In truth, it’s a states matter.’ That is what the opposition started their argument with: dental health is a matter that should be dealt with by the states. What the Rudd government is doing is ending the blame game. What the opposition want to do is maintain the blame game, continue to blame states and continue to harp about the failure of states. But it belies the truth in the debate. It belies what the opposition did when they were in government—they ripped $100,000 out of the health and dental area and axed $100 million a year from the CDHP as soon as they were elected. That really ends the blame game because the states were left holding the can and had to deal with it.

Then the opposition argued that the states have behaved in a criminal way. But it was criminal the way the opposition axed $100 million out of the CDHP program when they were in government. What they are arguing now is: ‘We’ve jumped on our white horse and we’re now going to ride back in and save the states.’ That is not ending the blame game. Prior to the election they put their proposal before the Australian public, but the Australian public judged fairly that they had created the mess and that their white horse riding in to fix the mess was not a white horse but a donkey. It was not a process that was going to come up with an outcome, and the record is clear as to what their input was.

The disallowance motion today is an irresponsible act by an opposition that still cannot accept that they lost the election, that the reins have passed to the Rudd government and that they have to let go of the reins. They still cannot accept that the programs we put forward and outlined on 13 May in the budget speech, our election commitments that we are delivering on, and want to deliver on, are the way in which the Australian public have said we should proceed. The opposition are now saying, ‘We want you to continue our failed program. We want you to continue to look at the issues that we were running prior to the election.’ Well, wake up; the world has changed. What the opposition have to do now is to accept that the world has changed and stop beating the drum for yesterday.

The dental programs that we have announced will have a significant impact on Australia’s dental crisis. The government is providing a total of $780 million over five years for additional dental services. This government is getting serious about these issues, unlike the opposition when they were in government. They are in truth crying crocodile tears about dental health. If they really care about dental health, they need to explain why they ripped $100 million a year from the Commonwealth Dental Health Program and ignored dental health as an issue for more than a decade. I did not hear that in the opposition’s faint defence of the disallowance motion. It was not raised. The only defence that was raised is that it is not the former Howard government’s fault; it is the fault of the states—let us just blame the states again! They are playing the blame game, but the real issue here is the 650,000 people they left to languish on public dental waiting lists. That is the real issue here, which they did not face up to over 11 years. They blamed the states. They are now trying to say, ‘Oh, our last belated attempt might help.’ They have been judged badly on that.

The Howard government belatedly introduced a dental scheme—the now opposition were starting to champion the referral processes, if I heard it correctly in their contribution today—but it was rife with complexity, restrictions and processes and eligibility criteria that were complex and so restrictive that few people would have been able to access it. But let us just pause for a moment. It is a serious issue. We acknowledge that some people did get help from the program—that is true—if they could navigate the complex referral process and red tape. But the sad fact is that many who tried to access the scheme could not get the assistance they required.

A few people, the most needy in our community, were let down. They were not let down in the dying days of the Howard government but over the last 11 years of the Howard government. The poorest people with the worst dental health did not get access to the previous government’s failed scheme. If you did not have the means and you had bad dental health because of the circumstances you found yourself in, you could not get treatment under the program. However, if you were wealthy and you had a chronic disease with complex care needs, you could get access to the program. That meant that people who were well-off could get access but people who needed care—a pensioner with an excruciating toothache, for example—could not get assistance.

That was the scheme they were championing, but we did not hear that from the opposition. What we heard from the opposition was a pitiful defence: ‘Oh, it is a disallowance motion; we want to continue our scheme and we want to try to help those people in the dental health area.’ Well, recognise that this government is actually taking action and support the bill that has passed, support the continuation of our program and support the measures that we are putting in place. If you want to act like a responsible opposition, then hold us to account for our programs; hold us to account to ensure that we do deliver what we have set out to do and hold us to account to ensure that we help those people in the community who are most needy and do not simply continue on with your scheme from when you were in government.

With regard to the people that those on the other side were championing, over four years to 30 April 2008, for example, in the whole of the Northern Territory no services at all were provided to children and young adults aged up to 24, even though the Northern Territory had some of our poorest and most marginalised Indigenous communities. As I said yesterday, over the same four years in South Australia no services—zip, zero—were provided to children up to the age of 14. This meant that during the entire term of the Howard government no child born and raised in South Australia or the Northern Territory got any assistance at all from the previous government’s failed dental scheme.

The opposition have to realise that they had 11 years to act. We had no action from them over the 11 years; all we have had from them was a last-ditch attempt to resurrect their failed scheme and address their failures over the 11 years. It was too late. It was not well constructed and, more importantly, the Australian public recognised that they were being conned. The white horse to end the dental problems was nothing more than a con. The public recognised that the previous government had an opportunity to act over 11 years and did not. The public also know that the current opposition were the ones that took $100 million out of the system and axed the program so that they could start the blame game and blame the states. The public were not going to be fooled by that and they made their decision. The opposition really do need to move on from where they were.

If you look at other states, the picture is similarly poor in large states. Only 52 people in Queensland under the age of 20 accessed the previous government’s program over four years to April 2008. On average that is only about one young person a month over four years across the whole of Queensland. Only 94 people in the whole of Victoria under the age of 20 received services in nearly four years. On average, that is only about two young people a month over four years from the whole of Victoria. These figures are the opposition’s proud record. They should be ashamed of it. It makes it clear that the previous government over their four terms failed to address the real needs in the community.

The Rudd government are supporting up to a million additional consultations and treatments targeted at those most in need through our $280 million investment in the Commonwealth Dental Health Program, and 1.1 million eligible teenagers will have access to preventative health checks through our $490 million investment in our kids’ teeth through the Medicare Teen Dental Plan. In disallowing the closure of the failed chronic disease dental program, the opposition will be opposing the savings that will help pay for the Rudd government’s better targeted programs. They are undertaking a thoughtless opposition for opposition’s sake. It is opposition to say no to anything, to cling on to the Howard government’s failed programs, to cling on to the Howard government era. It is time that they moved on and behaved like a responsible opposition.

The Liberal Party have chosen between—and this is very clear—responsible economic management and responsible health policy, and short-term cheap politics, and they have taken the latter road. They have taken the low road, the road of cheap politics, by using the Senate to disallow this process so that their scheme cannot be wound up and closed. They do not want to debate a policy issue; they want to use Senate processes to keep their scheme alive. They need to understand that the time has come to move on and take the reins of being a responsible opposition. I wish you well in that task; you have not addressed it yet. You might get there ultimately. I hope that you do at some point because any government needs a responsible opposition to hold them to account, scrutinise their legislative agenda and scrutinise their policy initiatives—not one that is going to pursue cheap politics, particularly at the expense of people’s dental health.

We have also found that this is really just a cruel hoax by the opposition. They are not going to address it. They cannot address it from opposition. They should not try to cavil with the government’s policies on this; they should allow us to continue to roll out our policies to ensure that we can make a difference and work cooperatively with the states—unlike the former government.