By Cllr Rob White
In Reading and across the country, the Green Party is fighting back against the decay in NHS dentistry services.
The Conservative’s recently announced ‘dental recovery plan’ is not enough and it will fail to fill the giant hole in NHS dentistry provision.
Labour failing on dentistry locally
Locally we were disappointed by Reading Labour’s vague response to our petition calling for more NHS dentists. The council still hasn’t produced an oral health strategy despite committing to do this six years ago in 2018.
Neither have they promoted the one-off NHS dental checkups at Bespoke Dental.
If you meet certain criteria (new to the town, not had a checkup for two years etc) you may be able to get a one-off NHS dental checkup from Bespoke Dental (previously called Gentle Dental) in Tilehurst who are involved in a pilot.
They are also offering emergency NHS treatment to people who are not registered with them.
You cannot register with them as a NHS patient though.
Contact them for details: https://www.bespokedentalreading.co.uk/
We are still lobbying on this and you can sign our petition here: https://bit.ly/dentistpetition
Conservatives failing on dentistry nationally
The scenes of people in Bristol queuing up in desperation to secure an NHS appointment and having to be held back by police are truly shocking.
The British Dental Association also reports cases of three-year-olds with dental sepsis, an epidemic of DIY dentistry and the return of scurvy.
This indicates just how broken our society is.
The dental recovery with its paltry £200 million offer will clearly fail to fill the giant hole in NHS dentistry provision. The underlying problem is that dentists are not being paid the full costs of NHS dental treatment.
The Green Party is calling for a new approach, starting with new contracts for NHS dentists that cover the costs of care. Greens are lobbying on this locally and nationally.
Greens are the second largest party in Reading
As the main opposition party on Labour-run Reading Council Green councillors will continue to work constructively to get the best for Reading residents. There are now seven Green Party councillors and we are now two councillors ahead of the Conservatives. We will keep working hard all year round on the issues that matter to residents.
If you’re keen on being part of the change in Reading, get involved and help us make Reading fairer, greener and cleaner: reading.greenparty.org.uk/get-involved
Green Party Park ward councillor Rob White is the leader of the main opposition group on Reading Borough Council
