Debate contribution: NHS Dentistry

Debate contribution by Mrs Diane Dodds on 28 April 2026.

MLA

Mrs Diane Dodds

Party at the time

Democratic Unionist Party

Date

28 April 2026

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

NHS Dentistry

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5510098

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I beg to move

Thank you. Minister, National Health Service dentistry faces an existential threat. Northern Ireland has seen the most rapid decline of health service dentistry anywhere in the United Kingdom. Registration with an NHS dentist has plummeted to the lowest level in a generation. It has dropped by 17% over the past year and by 389,000 individuals since early 2023. Only half of Northern Ireland's population — fewer than one million people — are registered with an NHS dentist, yet over two million are registered with a GP. In my Upper Bann constituency, we had the highest level of lapsed registrations anywhere in Northern Ireland in 2024-25. In one year, a staggering 33,923 registrations were closed due to those patients not being seen within a 24-month period. A colossal number of people in my constituency now have no dental check-ups or access to oral healthcare. The number of treatments in December 2025 was 40% lower than in 2018, and, in 2023, the adult oral health survey found an increased level of dental cavities compared with the previous survey in 2009. Last February, the British Dental Association (BDA) referenced the risk of turning to Victorian-era solutions and highlighted reports of DIY dentistry, with people pulling their own teeth and needing emergency surgery due to untreated dental infections. Minister, I hesitate to say this, but I can think of no other way of describing it: that is a shameful situation that will have huge repercussions for many years to come. No doubt, Minister, you will reference the recent allocation of £8 million to the service. I would be grateful if you could confirm that that money became available because of an underspend in the allocation due to the lack of NHS dental activity. The allocation is welcome, but it will not address the fundamental issue. It is not sufficient, and it will not stabilise a service that is crumbling around us, with significant impacts on families and communities. We need to see published without delay and in full the cost-of-service review led by Professor Ciaran O'Neill. It was commissioned in December 2024. The findings of that review should form the basis for early engagement with the profession on realistic remuneration for dental care and procedures. With barely a year remaining of the Assembly mandate, the focus must be on making substantial progress. A failure to prioritise dental care will ensure that the service will become totally unviable, and there will be huge ramifications. Sadly, there is a COVID generation of children who have no experience of attending a dentist and who will eventually present with exacerbated dental decay.

Northern Ireland's dentists want an NHS service that works for all. However, data published last month shows that NHS work is falling more rapidly here in Northern Ireland than in other parts of the United Kingdom. The proportion of dentists spending more than 75% of their time in the NHS is 59% in Scotland and 45% in Wales, but in Northern Ireland it is only 39%. Northern Ireland invests less in dental services per head of population than other parts of the United Kingdom. In 2003-04, government spend on dentistry per capita was £52 in Northern Ireland compared with £56 in Wales and £67 in Scotland.

Northern Ireland's dentists earn considerably less than their colleagues in other parts of the United Kingdom — on average, 10% less than their English counterparts and 17% less when compared with Scotland. Of course, as with GPs and other services, that erosion of take-home pay has been exacerbated by the National Insurance rises put in by Rachel Reeves in the October 2024 Budget. In many circumstances, dentists are effectively losing money by treating health service patients and are having to make up that shortfall by treating private patients. The system disincentivises practices from taking on NHS patients, particularly those with complex needs. There is a focus on individual units of activity like filling teeth rather than a more holistic approach to preventing poor oral healthcare. There needs to be a complete overhaul of the current payment model. Minister, this House needs to ask today: are you convinced that the current model for dentistry is viable? We want to hear the answer in your response. Many dentists would not choose to turn their back on the NHS, but they feel that they are being driven out by an unworkable system. Consequently, hard-working families are not able to access an NHS dentist and may not be able to afford the bills for the alternatives. Again, Minister, I know that you are deeply concerned about health inequalities, and the health inequalities annual report, published on 25 March, demonstrated that, in 2024-25, the rate of dental extractions in the most deprived areas was still more than double that in the least deprived areas. The standardised dental filling rate in the most deprived areas of Northern Ireland was 37,738 per 100,000, compared with just over 24,000 in the least deprived areas. Being registered with a dentist is more likely in wealthier areas. The standardised dental registration rate is 51,000 per 100,000 in the most deprived areas but higher, at at least 52,000, in the least deprived areas. That is not a situation that we can continue with, and that unevenness in access to dental care is leading to young people being put in the most difficult positions, with families barely able to afford dental healthcare. We need to reverse the trend, particularly when it comes to health inequalities. What is being done in Northern Ireland does not compare favourably with actions that are being taken in England, where there is an expansion of dental places, with 50 more dentists trained every year. Many more dentists from overseas are being fast-tracked into the system so that England will have even more dentists by 2028-29, and patients are benefiting from millions more dental appointments, as new figures show that 1·8 million additional dental treatments have been provided in England in just the last seven months. In Wales, a new NHS dental contract based on need and risk has come into effect this month. Minister, I have presented a picture of a key National Health Service service that is in the most extreme of circumstances. There is no time to wait. There is a great deal to be done. The cost-of-service review is a key step, and rapid progress is required in the weeks and months ahead to get dentistry back on a more stable and sustainable footing in Northern Ireland. Finally, Minister, I have spoken to many people in the profession and even more who come into my constituency office. Many fear that you are simply running down the clock on the issue. I urge you that making progress before the end of the mandate is a must. I trust that your response will be encouraging to thousands of families and young children in Northern Ireland who have no NHS dentist and find it very difficult to access appropriate dental health services. So many deserve so much better.

I thank the Member for giving way. I omitted to say that we will support the amendment.

1,192 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 15:28 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

Disagree with this assessment?

Classifications can be challenged. A person reads every challenge, and any change is recorded publicly above with its reason.

Challenge this classification