NHS Dentistry

Andrew Western Excerpts

Tuesday 9th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Western (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

After 14 long years of Conservative Government, our country is going backwards. Nothing demonstrates that better than the dire condition of NHS dentistry. What kind of country has this Government allowed us to become when people are forced to pull out their own teeth with pliers, because locating a dentist taking new patients is almost impossible? Talk about going backwards: the Conservatives are dragging us back to Victorian times.

The lack of access to NHS dentistry is one of the most common issues raised with me by constituents in Stretford and Urmston. The most recent data available shows that only 4% of dental practices in my local authority area of Trafford are accepting new adult patients on the NHS. Moreover, the current NHS “find a dentist” website is badly out of date. Despite claims to the contrary, a search using a postcode from Old Trafford in my constituency reveals that none of the top five results is accepting new patients. My constituents tell me they waste time they do not have calling around surgeries because of the results they have been given, only to be disappointed.

For the lucky few who can find a dentist, the wait times for treatment are simply unacceptable. As of September last year, there were almost 2,000 patients waiting for oral surgery in my local authority area of Trafford, with the majority waiting far longer than the NHS 18-week target for treatment. Behind these numbers are people enduring months of pain, distress and misery. In many cases, their ability to work or learn is affected. They cannot sleep. They cannot enjoy the basics of life, like food and drink, and do not feel confident enough to go out with friends and family socially. That is the impact. That is the devastation that this crisis is causing up and down the country.

Although no one doubts the challenges that the pandemic has caused NHS dentistry, the truth is that a lack of funding and a failure to reform in the preceding decade left NHS dentistry uniquely exposed to the impact of the virus. Between 2010-11 and 2021-22, total funding for dental services in England fell by 8%, leaving budgets that have been unable to keep up with inflation or population growth. Although today many Conservative Members have been quick to complain about the dental contract, their party has been somewhat slower to do anything about it, taking 12 years to make what have widely been acknowledged as minor tweaks—tweaks that were criticised at the time by the BDA, which said that their implementation would make “little meaningful difference”.

The Prime Minister pledged to restore NHS dentistry during his leadership campaign, but, over a year later, we know that a pledge from this Prime Minister is the kiss of death for whatever service he is highlighting. Lo and behold, his dental recovery plan, which was promised last April, is still nowhere to be seen. In contrast, Labour has a plan and it will not take us 14 years to deliver it. We will take immediate action to provide: 700,000 more urgent appointments; new incentives for new dentists to work in areas with the greatest need; supervised toothbrushing in schools for three to five-year-olds; and reform of the dental contract to rebuild the service in the long run. That is the type of ambition needed to address the scale of this enormous crisis, and it is an ambition that will have the funding it needs to become reality.

Politics is about choices. We on the Labour Benches choose NHS dentistry, ending the misery, the wait and the pain for so many, over tax breaks for the super-rich. There should be no contest. I urge all Members, including those on the Conservative Benches, to support the substantive motion.