Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the policy paper entitled Faster, simpler and fairer: our plan to recover and reform NHS dentistry, published on 7 February 2024, whether funding for that plan will come from integrated care boards' underspend of their dentistry budget; and whether her Department plans to provide additional funding to help meet the objectives of that plan.

The Dentistry Recovery Plan, published on 7 February 2024, is backed by £200 million. This is from the £3.8bn primary, community and secondary dentistry budget allocated to Integrated Care Boards for 2024/25. We know that the dental sector has a history of under-performance against commissioned activity and the plan will help to drive new activity that otherwise wouldn’t happen. We are committed to protecting NHS dentistry funding for dentistry, and will strengthen this ringfence for 2024/25, as set out in Our Dentistry Recovery Plan. NHS England has issued planning guidance to integrated care boards, which confirms that a ringfence will apply to NHS dentistry budgets in 2024 to 2025, and that NHS England reserves the right to direct that any unused resources are used to improve dental access through the implementation of the dental recovery plan. In addition, any unspent allocation may be returned to NHS England.