Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether she has considered the potential merits of a dedicated scheme to guarantee NHS dental check-ups for children.

The Government’s 10-Year Health Plan confirmed that child dental health is a priority, and we are committed to delivering fundamental reform of the dental contract before the end of this Parliament to increase dental access and appointments for children and other National Health Service patients. In the meantime, we have introduced other changes to benefit child dental health, as set out in the answer of 18 June in response to Question 9627.

The latest NHS Dental Statistics show continued improvement across a range of key measures, with more NHS dental care being delivered, more dentists providing NHS services, improved access for patients including children which exceeds pre-pandemic levels, increased preventative care for children, and record levels of urgent dental activity. The latest annual dental statistics can be found at the following link:

https://www.nhsbsa.nhs.uk/statistical-collections/dental-england/dental-statistics-england-202526