Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the answer by Lord Prior of Brampton on 19 January (HL Deb, col 641) about the potential fortification of bread with folic acid to prevent neural tube defects in pregnancy, why they do not apply the argument "around choice and whether or not it is right to medicate the entire population for the benefit of a fairly small part of it" to the fluoridation of water supplies to prevent caries.

It has been the policy of successive governments that decisions on water fluoridation are best taken locally. There is a duty to consult the local population where local authorities propose the establishment of a new water fluoridation scheme. Some areas of the country have water supplies that naturally contain levels of fluoride similar to the target level for water fluoridation schemes where the levels are adjusted.