Question Time — Scottish Executive — General Questions – in the Scottish Parliament at 11:41 am on 13 September 2007.
To ask the Scottish Executive what plans it has to improve access to national health service dental services in Fife. (S3O-609)
The responsibility for the overall provision of NHS dental services in an area rests with the NHS board. NHS Fife has a number of projects under way that propose to create, over the next two years, an additional 27 salaried general dental practitioner surgeries over five sites throughout Fife to help to increase access to NHS dental services in its area.
The Scottish National Party's manifesto stated:
"Scotland has one of the worst records in Europe for dental health".
In his 5 September statement on the Government's programme, the First Minister expressed concern that one in three children living in severe poverty does not have access to an NHS dentist. However, "Principles and Priorities: the Government's Programme for Scotland" is silent on the issue of dentists. Is the minister aware of the shortage of NHS dentists in Fife? Is she aware that many of my constituents in North East Fife want to access an NHS dentist but are unable to do so?
In a debate in 2005, the then Opposition spokesperson Shona Robison stated:
"The Executive will be judged on whether everyone who wants access to an NHS dentist will get access to an NHS dentist within a reasonable timeframe."—[Official Report, 17 November 2005; c 20799.]
What does the minister think that a reasonable timescale is? Can she explain why the word "dentist" does not even appear in the Government's programme of priorities?
I gently remind Mr Smith that his party's Administration had eight years in which to resolve the very difficult issues in NHS dentistry. In the four months that this Administration has been in power, we have ensured that the matter has been given the highest priority in our discussions with every NHS board in Scotland. We have ensured that boards are clear about their plans to expand the salaried dental service. I can tell the member that we will leave NHS dentistry in a far fitter state at the end of our four-year term than his party did after eight years of failure.