NHS Dentistry

Judith Cummins Excerpts

Tuesday 9th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)]

The Nuffield Trust recently announced that without radical action universal NHS dentistry was “gone for good”. Some 90% of practices across the UK no longer accept new NHS patients. For 14 years this Conservative Government have brought about the decay of our vital NHS dental healthcare services, so now is the time for a clear strategy, a recommitment to the future of a universal NHS dental service, and a Government who are determined to provide the care that people across this country, and their children, deserve.

The crisis of NHS dentistry has been entirely predictable. In fact, I have been at the forefront of these predictions over many years. Just last year, in a debate that I led in this place, I described the path of NHS dentistry as a “slow-motion car crash”. In 2016, I warned of a mounting crisis and drew the Government’s attention to a report warning that half of dentists were thinking of leaving the NHS. In the following years, I again warned that the number of dentists intending to leave the NHS was rising even further and, in 2020, after years of repeated warnings, I once again informed the Government that of those remaining, some 58% of the UK’s dentists were planning to move away from NHS dentistry within five years.

Last year, the then Minister assured the House that he was planning to publish a plan to reform dentistry, but the limited reforms proposed in July did little but paper over the growing cracks. More than 1,000 dentists have left the NHS since the pandemic, and the number of treatments completed each year is now 6 million lower than it was before the pandemic. Even before the pandemic, access was poor, with only enough dentistry commissioned for around half the population in England. As it stands, the future is bleak. A BDA survey shows that 75% of dentists are thinking of reducing their NHS commitments this year.

In Bradford, a shocking 445 people had to be treated in hospital for dental-related issues between 2022 and 2023. This cannot be the future of NHS dentistry: extractions and emergency care, but only for those who cannot afford private dental care. One dentist in my constituency said:

“I've been saying it for years: the NHS dental contract needs fundamental reform. Without immediate action, there will be no Universal NHS Dentistry.”

But NHS dentistry is not yet “gone for good”. That claim would leave swathes of people in this country destined for a future of rotting teeth and poor dental health. We cannot stand by and let the principle of NHS dentistry in this country be eroded. The decline is not irreversible or inevitable—it is a political choice.

I know that targeted investment is possible. In 2017, I worked on a project in Bradford with the then Health Minister, the hon. Member for Winchester (Steve Brine), who is now Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee. The project invested £250,000 of unused contract clawback in my Bradford South constituency, and ensured that patients were able to access roughly 3,000 new NHS dental appointments in an area of proven high dental deprivation. Although that provided a short-term solution, it did not address the wider long-term issue of access to NHS dental care. We can still save NHS dentistry, but we need a Government who are committed to reform and to the NHS.

It right that the Labour party puts NHS dentistry front and centre alongside plans to build an NHS fit for the future. Labour has committed to provide an extra 700,000 urgent dental appointments and to real reform of the NHS dental contract. As the Leader of the Opposition, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), has made clear on many occasions, healthcare must be as much about prevention as it is about cure.

In 2021-2022, tooth decay was, shamefully, the most common reason for hospital admission for children between six and 10 years old. This country once had a strong school dental service, and with such shocking rates of child tooth decay, it is time to look again at that policy, and at the role of dental therapists in the NHS. It is the right thing to do to catch up on a generation of lost dental health. NHS dentistry is not “gone for good”, but it stands on the edge of a new era. There is one clear solution: the Government must recommit to a universal NHS dental service that will care for every person, from the cradle to the grave.