Health minister questioned by MPs on the dental access crisis

The first question came from Aron Bell, MP for Newcastle-under-Lyme, who explained that he had been meeting with dental professionals in his constituency regarding access issues. Aron said he “welcomes” the government’s plans to “increase the number of dentists” and reiterated his support for plans to open a dental school at Keele University. However, he noted that something needs to be done in the short term, which the backlog of overseas clinicians waiting to take the registration exam would be able to help fix. So, Aron inquired if the secretary of state had plans to “expedite” the process.

Steve informed the minister that the government is “taking both long-term and short-term actions.” While the long-term plan is to “boost the number of dentists being trained”, Steve explained that changes have already been made to allow the “General Dental Council the flexibility to improve the way professionals are registered, giving more flexibility in terms of the skills mix and, for example, tripling the number of people sitting part 1 this year, so that more overseas professionals can be recognised and qualified to practise in the UK.”