3. Will the First Minister make a statement on access to dentistry during the COVID-19 pandemic? OQ56018

Llywydd, I thank Carwyn Jones for that. We continue to implement a safe, phased re-establishment of dental services. The majority of dental practices now provide a full range of treatments for patients in Wales. COVID-19-required public health measures, however, remain necessary. Safety considerations mean that fewer patients can be treated in any one clinical session.

I thank the First Minister for his response. Does the First Minister share my concerns that the rhetoric, naivety and sheer ineptitude of the Brexiteers in the UK Government will make it far more difficult for us to recruit dentists and other staff for public services during this pandemic and beyond?

I thank Carwyn Jones for that supplementary question. He's absolutely right—in dentistry, 17 per cent of all dentists currently registered with the General Dental Council come from Europe. That percentage is higher in the larger, corporate companies who supply a large percentage of dental services. It's estimated that dentists who are recruited from the European Union provide as much as 30 per cent of all NHS dental treatment here in Wales, and those people have already stopped coming, Llywydd. That is the point, isn't it? They don't believe that they will be welcome in the United Kingdom of the sort that Mr Reckless would wish to devise. He'd rather they weren't here and they hear that message from him and, as a result, they have stopped coming. They had no certainty over their employment, they had no certainty over their residence, they faced the declining value of the pound as a result of the way that Brexit has been navigated by this Government.

I think I referred last time, Llywydd, to a meeting that I attended, led by the then First Minister. It was in his office with the first Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, David Davis. The then First Minister put a series of really important points to the Secretary of State about the Irish border, about Welsh ports, about the recruitment to public services. Carwyn Jones in his supplementary question referred to ineptitude and naivety. Well, it was fully on display that day. We were told that this would be the easiest negotiation that we had ever entered into, that the United Kingdom knew what we were doing and those foreigners would fall apart as soon as we put our demands on the table. How wrong he turned out to be.

First Minister, the issue of dentistry is a very hot topic in the Clwyd West constituency at the moment as a result of an announcement by Bupa Dental Care UK that they're going to be closing their clinic in Colwyn Bay. That's going to affect around 12,000 people in my constituency, and they've been advised by the local health board that they should seek to register with other NHS dentists in the north Wales area. Having contacted those dentists, they're told that they're not taking on extra patients. I heard what you said in response to Carwyn Jones's questions, but the reality is that you should have been training more dentists over the past decade; you shouldn't be having to rely on dentists coming in from overseas. If we had trained sufficient numbers—and you've been responsible for workforce planning for the past 20 years—then we wouldn't be in the pickle that we're currently in, with a shortage of dentists across Wales. 

Now, I've asked to meet with your health Minister and the chief dental officer to discuss the situation in Colwyn Bay, and they've refused to accept my request for a meeting. So, can you tell me what action is your Government taking to make sure that we've got sufficient numbers of dentists being trained in Wales now to meet the future needs of the Welsh population? And how can you reassure people in Colwyn Bay that they'll have access to NHS dental services as and when they need them in the future? 

Well, the pickle we're in, as the Member put it, is because of the advice that he and people like him gave to people in Wales that we would leave the European Union and they'd see no disadvantages at all in their lives. And yet what they're finding out is that his advice and the advice of people in his party has led to the position that they are facing in Colwyn Bay today, where a large corporate body, previously able to provide those services, is no longer able to attract the staff that are needed. That's a serious position in north Wales, as Siân Gwenllian explored with me here only two weeks ago. I explained then the actions that the health board is taking—the dental teaching unit that's to be established in Bangor that will attract further staff into the area; the work of the deputy chief dental officer, Professor Paul Brocklehurst, in providing advice directly to the health board. 

I disagree with what Darren Millar said about the future for dentistry. The future is not in relying entirely on more dentists—it is broadening the dental profession, it is making better use of other members of the dental team, and making sure that those high-volume activities that dentists need to be carried out can be carried out by people who are trained to do so, but do not need the very long training and the very scarce expertise that dentists themselves represent.

I have to say that I'm concerned that there's been a lack of planning in dentistry and ensuring that that service is sustainable for the future. I'm truly concerned about the position of dentistry in my constituency. The closure of private dental surgeries on the mainland recently has further exacerbated the problems people have in registering with and finding a dentist that does NHS work. The steps that I've taken along with a dentist in Anglesey to increase capacity have faced one barrier after the next, with us having already managed to attract two dentists in, but failing to get the board to increase the contract. In addition to that, I have huge concerns about what's happening to specialist dental services at Ysbyty Gwynedd, with the loss of services and a failure to recruit making me think that there is a plan to downgrade services. So, can we have a full review of dental services in my constituency, and indeed in broader north-west Wales?

Well, Llywydd, I agree with Rhun ap Iorwerth about the problems facing people in the west, in the south and in the north too. It also goes to the root of the problems that I have explained this afternoon. I will speak to the Minister to see whether there are more details that we can give Members, and to be clear with people about the steps that the health board in north Wales is taking to try and address the problems that they are facing at present.FootnoteLink

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