The DDU’s John Makin shares his hopes for the dental profession in 2026 and concludes with a reminder that goodwill is not just for the holiday season.
It’s frustrating that many of the things that I want to see happen in 2026 are echoes of last year. I won’t be alone in that but I’m optimistic that we aren’t set for a ‘groundhog year’.
Although the biggest challenge remains getting much-needed reforms over the line, especially in Westminster, our new year wish list reflects progress in several policy areas.
A new dental contract that recognises the value of family dentists
The government has acknowledged that the system is broken and introduced some intermediate fixes last year while negotiations continue. However, measures like tweaks to bands, mandating unscheduled care and increasing intervals between check-ups still fall short of the wholesale reform that the BDA wants to see.
Historically, the DDU has not commented on contractual matters, but the current system has dentolegal implications, affecting professional wellbeing and helping to drive up patient complaints.
We want to see fair remuneration and relieve the pressure on our members and at the same time we want to preserve what is of value. Family dental practices have always given their patients a feeling of continuity, familiarity and confidence. It would be a shame if the government’s plans for dentistry, not least the introduction of Neighbourhood Health Centres, undermined this and we will continue to champion family dentistry’s place at the heart of the service.
Fresh movement on clinical negligence reform
We’re hopeful that the government will consult on clinical negligence reform once it has had the chance to study David Lock KC’s advice on the rising legal costs of clinical negligence claims. It is also under pressure from the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), which is currently looking into the issue.
The DDU would particularly welcome the revival of plans to limit legal costs in clinical negligence claims and for this to be extended to claims valued up to £250,000. This would have a material effect on dental claims where the payments to lawyers often exceed the level of compensation paid to patients.
A timescale for a fairer and faster fitness to practise system
Dentistry wasn’t mentioned in May when the government announced it would modernise the legislative frameworks of three professional healthcare regulators in this parliament. This is disappointing because the GDC has some of the oldest governing legislation of any UK-wide healthcare professional regulators and its fitness to practise process is ripe for reform.
Even if there is no finding of fact against them or their practice is found not to be impaired, GDC investigations cause real emotional strain for dental professionals, many of whom find they have to put their careers and lives on hold for many months while the process unwinds. While the fitness to practise process itself is not supposed to be punitive, the cumulative effect of all the pressure, tortuous delays and sometimes financial hardship is a punishing ordeal for those under scrutiny.
Solid commitments
The GDC is limited in what it can do without new legal powers, which is why we hope the government will commit to a timetable for reform this year. In the meantime, it has gone some way to acknowledging the ‘climate of fear’ surrounding fitness to practise with its new Corporate Strategy for 2026-28, which says it wants to ‘explore less adversarial ways of handling and resolving concerns’. In 2026, the GDC says it will develop options for closing cases earlier, launch enhanced wellbeing support services and review quality assurance processes.
This is a positive step and the DDU will respond constructively when the GDC sets out its proposals. We’d also like to see the GDC improve the timeliness of the fitness to practise process, particularly after the assessment stage. Its most recent statistical report showed that a decision was reached in just 4% of cases within the 13 working week target in Q4 2024 and the median time from case examiner decision to initial hearing in 2024 was 10 months and six days, overshooting the nine month target.
An end to ‘blue on blue’ attacks
With everything we know about the mental health toll of the fitness to practise process, it was disappointing to discover that registrants are the source of an increasing number of concerns raised with the GDC (now 9% compared with 6% in 2022), according to its statistical report.
Of course, there will be cases where dental professionals have no choice – maybe their colleague ignored the issue or presents a real risk to patient safety. But given the GDC is obliged to assess every report, we hope they wouldn’t subject a fellow dental professional to months of uncertainty and stress in bad faith.
These ‘blue on blue’ attacks are counterproductive when professional isolation is an issue for many and the dental service has been in permacrisis for some time. That’s why the final item on our wish list is for colleagues to look out for and support each other in 2026. The ideal of a community of dental professionals has never felt more important.
This article is sponsored by the Dental Defence Union (DDU).
