Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to increase provision of NHS dental practices.

National Health Service dental practices have been able to open for face to face NHS dental care, including routine care, from 8 June. NHS England and NHS Improvement have set out guidance that dentists should focus on care that is urgent, care to vulnerable groups and then overdue routine appointments.

A steady increase in dental activity has been made possible following updated Infection Prevention and Control guidance issued by Public Health England. Contractual arrangements for quarter four have been introduced by NHS England and NHS Improvement requiring dental practices to deliver 45% of contracted units of dental activity from 1 January to 31 March 2021 to be deemed to have delivered the full contractual volume. This is expected to increase available NHS dental care for all patients.

The Department is working closely with NHS England and NHS Improvement and the Office of the Chief Dental Officer on contractual arrangements for 2021/22 onwards and work is ongoing to increase levels of service, as fast as is safely possible.