In July 2004 we announced that we were to fund an additional 170 training places for dentists. A Joint Implementation Group (JIG) comprising representatives of the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), the Department of Health and the National Health Service was established to manage the expansion programme. Of the 170 places, the JIG allocated 89 on a permanent basis to the nine universities with existing undergraduate dental schools enabling each of them to increase their annual intake to 75 new students. There are currently two dental schools in London, with the remaining schools located in Bristol, Birmingham, Sheffield, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and Newcastle upon Tyne.

The JIG then allocated the remaining 91 places to the existing schools on a temporary basis in order to hold a competition for the permanent allocation of these places. In response to an invitation to all higher education institutions the JIG received bids from eight of the nine universities with existing dental schools for further expansion and seven bids (subsequently short-listed to six) from universities wishing to establish new dental schools. After short-listing, there were bids for 578 places under consideration. In acknowledgment of the quality of these bids and the importance of the needs they addressed, additional funding was found to increase the number of places on offer to 100.

The JIG applied the following criteria to the assessment of these bids: geography, innovation, quality, potential to widen participation in higher education, value for money and the viability of the proposals for recruiting academic staff. The Majority of the bids were of very high quality offering a wide range of innovations in recruiting students and staff and teaching methods. Strategic/geographical considerations were therefore of particular significance.

For example, the JIG noted that there are five dental schools/dental teaching hospitals in the North, but none south of a line from Bristol to London. On the other hand, levels of dental disease are generally higher in the North, except in areas where drinking water is fluoridated. Areas distant from the main conurbations (and therefore from the existing dental schools) often have fewer dentists in relation to population than other areas.

The JIG submitted its recommendations to the HEFCE Board in December 2005 and, at its meeting on 26 January 2006, the Board decided to approve:

the bid from the Universities of Exeter and Plymouth for a new Peninsula Dental school with places for 62 students to be admitted annually from 2007 the bid from the University of Liverpool in conjunction with the University of Central Lancashire for the development of 32 outreach training places for dental students in Lancashire and Cumbria, subject to further discussion of points of detail; and the University of Leeds to be allocated six new places to develop outreach training for dental students in Hull.