Plan to increase access to NHS dentists in England ‘a complete failure’, MPs say

The official plan to increase access to NHS dental services in England has been a “complete failure”, and some of the government’s initiatives have worsened the crisis, a damning report warns.

Millions of patients continue to be denied dental care, forcing them to pay for private treatment, build up mountains of credit card debt, or even worse perform dangerous DIY dentistry on their own teeth, the research by MPs found.

Without immediate and significant changes to fix the “broken” system, there would be no future for population-wide access to NHS dentistry, the report by the public accounts committee (PAC) said.

“This country is now years deep in an avalanche of harrowing stories of the impact of dentistry’s system failure,” said Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, the chair of the committee. “It is utterly disgraceful that, in the 21st century, some Britons have been forced to remove their own teeth.”

He added: “Last year’s dental recovery plan was supposed to address these problems, something our report has found it has signally failed to do. Almost unbelievably, the government’s initiatives appear to have actually resulted in worsening the picture, with fewer new patients seen since the plan’s introduction.”

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Source: The Guardian, 4 April 2025