Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment he has made of the adequacy of the (a) level and (b) quality of the provision of NHS dentistry services to children under the age of 12.

NHS England is responsible for commissioning primary care dental services to meet the needs of the local population and ensuring where there are shortages these are addressed.

Latest data from the GP Patient Survey shows that seven million children were seen by a dentist in the 12 month period ending 31 December 2018.

NHS England has developed two initiatives that are directly targeting children’s oral health. The Starting Well programme was established by NHS England to reach out to children not regularly being seen by a dentist in 13 high needs areas. NHS England has advised that here are currently over 200 practices participating in the programme.