Health and Care Bill

Baroness Finlay of Llandaff Excerpts

Lords Hansard - Part 2 & Report stage
Monday 7th March 2022 Lords Chamber

With those remarks, my opposition to the fluoridation of the water supply remains. I would like to understand further the reasons for which this power to fluoridate the water supply is being transferred away from the local authorities—which, to me, would be a better and more local way of accepting or rejecting this. What consultation has there been with the water companies and from which budget of the Department of Health and Social Care will this come?

[Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB)]

My Lords, the hour is late and I shall be brief. The findings of the systematic review of the subject need to be taken into consideration. Screening of over 3,000 papers resulted in careful analysis of 254—quite a large number for a systemic review. Going through this, there are overall benefits. The benefits outweigh any documented harms, and I welcome the clause.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I am also aware of the hour, and offer Green support for the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh. We are talking here about a cost-benefit analysis. Some of the costs on which I would focus, and their impacts, go beyond the narrowly medical impacts of the people who consume the water. The question I raised in Committee was whether people today actually consume tap water, and whether they will continue to do so. I made the point that 90% of people drank tap water in 1978, but that figure had fallen to 73% by 1998. I do not believe that there have been detailed national figures since then.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, for writing to me in response to that debate and providing a set of figures which the Government had researched. I will note two of the figures which the Minister cited in that letter. One was a 2010 Ipsos MORI survey in the West Midlands showing that two-thirds of surveyed people supported water fluoridation if it was going to improve dental health. That, of course, shows that a third of people are not supporting it. This is the group about which I am concerned—a group which I have encountered many times and in many parts of the country. I do not agree with all their concerns, but that is a fact.

I noted that the Minister also cited a north-east survey from 2021 where 60% of people backed water fluoridation. As the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, said, we are talking about people not having a choice about consuming that water, unless they choose to buy bottled water. Anyone going to a supermarket in Sheffield, particularly in its poorer areas, will see people buying bottled water in very large quantities. One of my concerns, and where I hope the cost-benefit analysis would come in, is looking at the sociological issues. The Government should be doing a great deal more to promote the consumption of tap water and to discourage the use of bottled water. However, as the Bill currently stands, it risks pointing us in the opposite direction.

The noble Lord, Lord Storey, talked in Committee about how Liverpool City Council had very successfully engaged in a targeted programme to address the most vulnerable communities and ensure that dental health was improved. It demonstrably was improved.

The Minister said, “Oh well, any local authority can do the same thing.” I point out to him that local authorities’ budgets are enormously overstretched—something we have addressed in the social care elements of the Bill in particular. Would the Government consider perhaps taking the money that might be spent on fluoridation and giving it to local authorities for targeted campaigns to reach the children who need it most?