Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of a per capita funding arrangement for NHS dentistry.

One of our missions is to rescue and rebuild National Health Service dentistry. To do this, we will reform the dental contract, with a shift to focus on prevention and the retention of NHS dentists.

There are no perfect payment systems, and careful consideration needs to be given to any potential changes to the complex dental system, so that we deliver a system better for patients and professionals.

Between 2011 and 2022, the Department tested a prototype system which included a mix of capitation and activity payments. The results of that trial are available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/dental-contract-reform-evaluating-the-results-of-the-prototype-scheme/dental-contract-reform-a-report-on-learnings-from-the-dental-contract-prototype-test-between-april-2016-and-march-2019