Nigel Jones asks whether the promise of contract reform and the 10-year plan are enough to give the dental profession hope for the NHS.
I recently heard a description of the recent 10-year plan for the NHS as being ‘not a plan but a manifesto’. That seems about right to me given the definition of a manifesto is ‘a public declaration of policy and aims’, and the definition of a plan is ‘a detailed proposal for doing or achieving something’.
Given the enormity of the challenge facing the NHS, a manifesto is actually the best for which we could have hoped, so the observation is not necessarily a criticism. To be fair, the commitment to introducing short-term changes to the contract was fairly quickly delivered upon with the publication of the consultation which contained some fairly granular detail.
However, the proposals are just one small step on the journey to the fundamental contract reform we’ve been promised. We are waiting with bated breath to see how the negotiations, due to start later this year as signposted in the 10-year plan, will unfold.
In common with many, I’ve been waiting for fundamental reform of the dental contract for many, many years. It’s easy to forgive the cynics who will believe it when they see it. That being said, I have to admit to being impressed with the performance of the minister for care, Stephen Kinnock, at the recent Health and Social Care Committee update on NHS dentistry.
Can NHS dentistry be salvaged?
As has seemed to be the trend in the various reviews into NHS dentistry we’ve seen this year, there were significantly more nods towards the reality of the situation and less of the bluff and bluster of past hearings. At the risk of being accused of sounding naïve, such acknowledgements have given me hope that there is a real understanding that making the best use of the financial envelope for NHS dentistry will require difficult decisions and clear priorities.
As Stephen Kinnock put it, we will ‘have to cut our cloth accordingly’. Maybe, just maybe, we are on the verge of salvaging an NHS dental service better able to reduce oral health inequality.
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