Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of allocating separate funding for (a) oral hygiene education and (b) toothbrushing schemes in schools located in areas with high levels of tooth decay.

The department is working with the Department of Health and Social Care to help promote and deliver supervised toothbrushing programmes for 3 to 5 year-olds in the most deprived communities.

We recognise that prevention is better than cure. For this reason, we will be targeting the areas of highest need in order to have the greatest impact on young children’s oral health.

Further information on the implementation timetable will be confirmed in due course.

Currently all state-funded schools in England are required to teach about good oral hygiene as part of the statutory health education set out within relationships, sex and health education statutory guidance. Independent schools are required to cover health education as part of their responsibility to provide personal, social, health and economic education.