Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I will read back to the Minister of State one line that he read. He stated:

The HSE public dental service also provides oral examination and treatment identified as necessary for children at three intervals, at ages six to eight years, 11 to 16 years and subject to capacity, nine to 11 years.

Why are we hearing from parents and on the doors that children in certain locations have never seen a dentist at any point in primary school if the Minister of State is saying that service is offered? It is not being offered. To be perfectly honest, it is insulting to people who feel that this public failure is a private cost that he would stand up and say that line. A dad rang me to tell me that he had spent €200 to get his three children checked out. If he had to do that, they must not be on a list. He said his family is struggling to pay the mortgage. I met a woman on a doorstep in Maynooth who said that her child had never seen a dentist in their entire time in primary school. There is no dental service. What is happening with the dental service? It is beyond patchy.

The Government talks about prudence. Prudence is about spending money rather than just collecting it. It is about spending it appropriately to deliver public services. Many of our public services are poverty-stricken. In this service, there is a postcode lottery and long queues. The Minister of State knows that but it is not reflected in the response he has given us. If you can afford to pay, you can bring your child to a private dentist. However, many people cannot do that.

What happens to those children who are not given the opportunity to see a dentist right through their primary care and where preventative action is not taken?

The other thing the Government does with public services like the dental service is to outsource it. It will throw money at the private sector rather than building a comprehensive public dental health service that is available for people at the point of need. That point of needs includes statutory obligations to provide screening for children.

It is impossible for us to deal with constituents when they say there is no screening service for whole areas. That has been happening for years. It is quite obvious that failure has been going on for years and the public is now raising routinely and when we are knocking on the doors this issue of the kind of services that are absent in their areas.

We are a very wealthy country but why are we not capable of putting basic public services in place with that wealth? That is the kind of question which makes people think we are a wealthy country but in many ways it feels like a poor country when it comes to public services. This is one of those public services where that poverty is felt.

If people can pay privately for their children, they will do that because they will not see their children neglected, but there is an awful lot of people who are not in a position to do that. We are also seeing people with medical cards who are not getting routine services. I pick up the point made by my colleague Deputy Shortall, where we are paying for extractions but not for preventative care, which is madness.

The other issue about screening and routine care is that other things are picked up like mouth cancers. If these are not picked up or dealt with, they are much more difficult to deal with for the individual with a late diagnosis. They are also much more expensive for the healthcare system. There is no rationale for not putting together a proper system from very early ages right up and certainly for people who do not have the ability or the funding to deal with issues as they are presented and identified. I have no doubt there are people suffering in pain because of the inadequate provision in this service.

I must say to the Minister of State about his statement that, if I was him, I would go back and haul over the coals whoever gave him that because it is a load of nonsense when he starts saying there is provision when we can clearly say there is not provision. It has been repeatedly raised with us that there is not provision. That is an insult and the Minister of State should not allow that to go past.

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