Dental Services: Huddersfield

(asked on 9th March 2023) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he has taken in the last 12 months to improve the capacity of NHS Dental provision in Huddersfield.


Answered by
Neil O'Brien Portrait
Neil O'Brien
This question was answered on 14th March 2023

NHS England is responsible for commissioning primary care dentistry to meet the needs of the local population. Many of the dentistry commissioning functions undertaken by NHS England will transfer to integrated care boards from April 2023. NHS England has made available to commissioners an Assurance Framework to provide assurances on commissioning.

In September 2022, we announced ‘Our plan for patients’ which sets out how we will meet oral health needs and increase access to National Health Service dental care, including in Huddersfield, whilst making the NHS dental contract more attractive to dental practices.

These changes have been implemented, including through regulations that came into effect on 25 November 2022. This includes enabling commissioning of up to 110% of contracted Units of Dental Activities to increase NHS care, fairer remuneration for practices providing complex treatment within current Band 2 treatments and removing barriers around use of staff skills mix in NHS dentistry. We have also worked with the General Dental Council on legislative proposals to allow the regulator greater flexibility to expand the registration options open to international dentists.

NHS England is holding further discussions with the British Dental Association and other stakeholders for additional reforms of the NHS Dental System planned to take place this year.

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