JOINT MEDIA RELEASE
Roxon and Debus to confront dental crisis in Central West
Sunday 29 July 2007

Labor’s Shadow Minister for Health Nicola Roxon and Labor’s candidate for Macquarie Bob Debus will mark national Dental Health Week on Tuesday with a public dental forum at Bathurst Entertainment Centre.

Ms Roxon said she was looking forward to hearing from the people of Bathurst and the surrounding community about their dental heath concerns.

“Federal Labor is all too aware of the dental crisis in communities across Australia. There are 650,000 people on waiting lists for dental care – some waiting years for treatment,” she said.

“Everywhere I visit around the country I hear horrendous stories about people’s dental care. It's an appalling state of affairs, and the fault lies solely at the feet of the Howard Government.

“These problems escalated after the Howard Government scrapped the Commonwealth dental program in 1996, ripping $100 million from public dental care across the country.

“The State and Territory Governments have doubled their investment in dental care over the past decade, yet John Howard and Health Minister Tony Abbott continue to blame the States for Australia’s dental crisis.”

Ms Roxon and Mr Debus will visit Westfund’s dental clinic in Lithgow before the community forum at midday on Tuesday.

“Westfund has established the clinic to help relieve the dental needs of their local community. This sort of intervention is necessary because of the crisis in accessing adequate public dental care in this region,” said Ms Roxon.

Following the public dental forum Ms Roxon and Mr Debus will meet representatives of Charles Sturt University to hear about progress with the University’s new dental school.

Mr Debus confirmed that Labor would support the dental school if elected later this year.

“Nicola confirmed with the university some months ago that Labor would support the new dental school. This will be a great initiative for our local community and will help to tackle the dental workforce shortages,” said Mr Debus.

Mr Debus welcomed federal Labor’s commitment to reinstate a Commonwealth-funded public dental health program and to ending the blame game plaguing Australia's health system.

“A Rudd Labor Government will work with the States to fix the national dental crisis and take pressure off working families in the Central West and those struggling to meet the costs of dental care,” said Ms Roxon.