Page 2825 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 14 August 1991
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The situation is, as I see it, that there is no problem. We can achieve the 0.5 parts plus or minus the 10 per cent if we mix the fluoride with another substance. Two suggestions have come forward from me and there may be others that are quite applicable as well. Under that circumstance we can do it, or we can do the 0.5 with an average dose, knowing full well that we will try to keep as close as possible to 10 per cent, which is the standard. Of course, it may flow out to 40 per cent on those few days of the year.
MR STEFANIAK (4.42): There has been an interesting debate, I suppose, over two years in relation to the fluoride issue. I certainly have read a considerable amount of material on it, especially after the first debate when I think the current Bills were enacted to put fluoride back into the water pending the result of the committee's inquiry. I must admit, as a result of personal experience and the material I have read, that I have come to the conclusion that there is no real reason to change what we have in the water at present.
I am not saying that necessarily that is completely right. I am saying that, if I had to apply a legal standard, I am satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that one part per million should remain. That is not to say that there may not be some further evidence, perhaps down the track, to indicate that these people might be right. I do not know. However, I am quite happy with the current amount of fluoride in the water.
Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, I do not believe in changing something that actually works. Since Canberra has had fluoride in its water, from what I can see, from the number of people I have seen - and I have lived here all my life - I have not come across anyone who has been substantially affected adversely by it.
Mr Stevenson: Dead is good enough.
MR STEFANIAK: No, I have not come across anyone like that, Dennis. I have come across a couple of people with some mild fluorosis on their teeth, but I have not come across someone who has had some of the more horrendous effects which some of the anti-fluoride lobby push. I have, however, come across numerous people who have lived in Canberra all their lives, who had dental caries when they were young, but whose children, some of whom are now about 25 or 26, have had no dental caries whatsoever - quite different from their parents.
I was born here. I had some dental caries. My dentist always said that I had good teeth when I was a kid and I have only about eight fillings. However, I wonder what would have happened if fluoride had been added in 1952 as opposed to 1964. I probably would have absolutely no fillings whatsoever. I know that this may be anecdotal, as
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