I express my gratitude to you at the outset for your courtesy in allowing me to raise on the Adjournment this very important matter of the failure of the Minister for Social Welfare to provide adequately for dental treatment for insured workers and their spouses, particularly in my constituency of Wexford.
My initial interest in this matter arose when a constituent contacted me regarding his frustration in not being able to receive full dental treatment, as promised, due to the dispute between the Minister for Social Welfare and the Irish Dental Association. He was gravely concerned that as he had become unemployed, his entitlement from PRSI contributions would have been exhausted before the dental treatment he required was made available to him.
I contacted the Department of Social Welfare initially on this matter in September last. At that time I was assured that only a few dentists had withdrawn from the social welfare scheme. Armed with that information I advised my constituent to contact another panel dentist in County Wexford in order to get the attention he needed from him. Indeed I supplied him with a list of panel dentists I had received from the Department. My constituent contacted each of the listed dentists and received a variety of replies; he was very assiduous in going from one to another. The first dentist he contacted was very forthcoming in his comments, indicating that most dentists do curtail treatment, including the provision of dentures, for PRSI patients. He went to a second dentist who examined my constituent, recomended fillings and informed him that the supply of dentures was excluded from the treatment afforded to PRSI patients. My constituent also told me that there was a sign in that panel dentist's waiting room indicating that there were exclusions in respect of the treatment provided for insured workers. Off went my constituent to yet a third dentist. The third dentist stated that he would treat my constituent for fillings but would not provide dentures under the PRSI scheme. My constituent arrived back to me.
I tabled a parliamentary question in March of this year asking the Minister for Social Welfare — in relation to a person in County Wexford — who ceased insurable employment in August 1988 and was unable during all of 1989 to obtain assistance towards the cost of dentures under the social welfare dental benefit scheme owing to the dispute between dentists and the Minister's Department, if he would ensure that the person concerned was given an opportunity to obtain the required dental benefits when the dispute with the dentists ceases. At that stage I assumed that the end of the dispute was in sight. I received a reply by letter, signed by an executive officer of the Minister's Department, stating that my constituent qualified for dental benefit on the basis of his present insurance contributions, that the Department would pay the relevant portion of the cost of dentures. An enclosure accompanied that letter listing the dentists operating the scheme in the Wexford area. Again, my constituent toddled off to the dentists listed and found none in Wexford to provide the treatment he required.
I tabled a further parliamentary question to the Minister for Social Welfare on 12 June last as follows:
To ask the Minister for Social Welfare if he will outline the number and identity of dentists in the Wexford area who are providing the full range of dental treatment entitlements to insured workers; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
In reply to that parliamentary question I received a long reply from the Minister, indicating that there was an ongoing dispute between his Department and the Irish Dental Association, that he was upset about it and, as a result, a number of dentists were improperly charging patients for extractions, root canal treatment and dentures. The Minister told me in the course of his reply that a number of complaints had been received from patients regarding inappropriate charges by some dentists, including some in County Wexford. The Minister said that those complaints had been investigated by his Department, that it had been confirmed that a number of the dentists were adhering to the Irish Dental Association's policy on this matter. He went on to say he was very concerned at all these facts. The final paragraph of that reply read:
The names and addresses of dentists in the Wexford area who are participating in the extended dental benefit scheme are made available on request at local Social Welfare offices or by telephone to the Department's head office. It is considered that the publication of names and addresses of participating dentists would not be in the interests of claimants or of the dentists concerned.
So I telephoned the Minister's Department asking for the name of any dentist who would provide my constituent with the services he required and to which he was legally entitled. An official of the Minister's Department told me on the telephone that he was unable to provide me with the name of any dentist who would provide dentures for insured workers in Wexford. In fact, the official admitted that the Department do not actually know which dentists provide which treatment under the scheme in County Wexford.
I have exhausted all avenues open to me on this matter. I have communicated with the Minister twice by way of parliamentary question. I have contacted him in writing. I have received numerous responses to my queries on behalf of my constituent, but my constituent is no further down the road and is now moving out of insurability.
In exasperation I raise this matter this evening in the expectation that the Minister will give a clear, unambiguous answer to me for the sake of this constituent, more especially for the scores of others in the same position in County Wexford and elsewhere. This dispute has been highlighted on occasions in the past and has now faded into the backwaters, seeming to receive no attention. I hope the Minister will clarify the matter once and for all and tell me how my constitutent is to get the benefits to which he is clearly entitled.
