2 2GM Tuesday May 24 2022 | the times
News
Half of high street dentists are planning
to cut all ties with the NHS, potentially
leaving millions of patients with no ac-
cess to treatment or routine check-ups.
The British Dental Association
(BDA) said pressures on the service
meant that thousands of dentists were
going private, warning: “This is how
NHS dentistry will die.”
It said that the “unprecedented col-
lapse in NHS commitment” was having
a catastrophic impact on patients, some
of whom had resorted to pulling out
their own teeth.
Dentists have traditionally done a
mix of NHS and private work, but many
say that it is no longer financially viable
to offer NHS treatment due to a lack of
government funding.
This has caused an exodus to the
private sector, with 3,000 dentists quit-
ting the NHS since the pandemic
began, leaving swathes of the country
with no easy access to dental care.
Patients with severe toothache re-
port struggling to find a dentist and
having no choice but to pay privately for
treatment amid a cost-of-living crisis.
The shortage has also forced some
schools to call in charities to treat pupilsNHS dentist exodus leaves
poorest without free care
Eleanor Hayward Health Correspondent who are crying in pain with tooth decay.
A poll of 2,200 dentists by the BDA
suggests the crisis is only going to get
worse. Nearly 50 per cent said they had
cut down NHS treatment since the
pandemic and 75 per cent said that they
would further reduce the number of
NHS patients they treat.
Some 45 per cent said they were like-
ly to go fully private, meaning they no
longer take on any NHS patients.
Analysis suggests only 33 per cent of
adults and less than 50 per cent of child-
ren have access to one of the 21,
NHS dentists in England. Patients in
the poorest areas are worst affected,
undermining the levelling-up agenda.
The BDA is calling for a new NHS
dental contract, claiming the present
one, imposed in 2006, is “unfit for pur-
pose,” does not pay enough for NHS
work and involves unrealistic targets.
Long-standing problems in finding a
dentist were exacerbated by the pan-
demic, when 40 million fewer appoint-
ments were carried out than in the two
years before Covid. Maria Caulfield, the
health minister, said the government
was “negotiating improvements to the
contract with the British Dental Asso-
ciation to ensure that working in the
NHS remains attractive to dentists”.Demanding
patients may
lose doctor
Kat Lay Health EditorPatients who make “unrealistic” de-
mands of a GP may be removed from
the surgery’s list under NHS guidance.
The document, which sets out how
and when patients can be deregistered,
says protecting primary care teams’
mental health is as important as
protecting their physical health.
It lists “unacceptable behaviours”, in-
cluding when patients “cause disrup-
tion”. The NHS England document fol-
lows concern about patients’ access to
services, with frustration on both sides.
Patients complain it can be hard to
get face-to-face appointments while
GPs say they are unable to meet
demand. The guidance, published this
month, says patients could also be
deregistered for using bad language.
The campaign group Rebuild GP
urged patients yesterday to direct their
anger towards the government. In an
open letter it said the system was “frac-
tured” after “decades of underfunding”.
An NHS official said: “Deregistering
a patient will always be an exceptional
step. However, the NHS will not toler-
ate abuse or violence towards its staff.”The British withdrawal from Afghan-
istan was a “disaster” and holidays
taken by leaders during the crisis re-
flected a “fundamental lack of serious-
ness” in government, MPs have con-
cluded in a report.
Members of the foreign affairs com-
mittee also found that Boris Johnson
probably intervened to demand the
evacuation of 173 stray dogs and cats
from Nowzad, an animal charity in Ka-
bul. They further condemned the For-
eign Office for being “intentionally eva-
sive, and often deliberately misleading”
about what had happened.
The MPs said that Pen Farthing, the
founder of the charity, had left Kabul on
August 28 last year as the only passen-
ger on a 230-seat private jet. Farthing
had used media appearances on TV
shows to lobby for his evacuation.
“The arbitrary and chaotic nature of
the Foreign Office’s role in the evacua-
tion process is illustrated by the case of
Nowzad,” the MPs said. “Amid intense
media attention, its staff were called for
evacuation at the last minute, despite
not meeting the prioritisation criteria,Afghanistan withdrawal was a
disaster and betrayal, say MPs
George Grylls Political Reporter after a mysterious intervention from
elsewhere in government. Multiple
senior officials believed that the prime
minister played a role in this decision.
We have yet to be offered a plausible
alternative explanation for how it came
about.”
About 18,000 people were evacuated
from Afghanistan amid desperate
scenes at Kabul airport.
Dominic Raab, who was foreign sec-
retary at the time, was on holiday with
his family in Crete as the crisis began.
Sir Philip Barton, permanent secretary
at the Foreign Office, stayed in France
until the evacuation was over. The MPs
said that he had made the wrong deci-
sion. “The fact that the department’s
top civil servant did not return until the
civilian evacuation was over, while staff
across the department struggled...
under intense pressure, is difficult to
understand and impossible to excuse,”
the report said.
With the exception of Sir Laurie Bris-
tow, who was then the ambassador to
Afghanistan, all Foreign Office officials
in Kabul fled the country early in the
evacuation, leaving soldiers to process
complex visa applications before aback-up team of civil servants was
eventually deployed.
The MPs said that the government
had failed to adequately prepare for the
withdrawal of US troops despite having
18 months’ notice and amid warnings
that the Taliban could rapidly seize
control of the country. “The manner of
the withdrawal of international forces
from Afghanistan was a disaster, a be-
trayal of our allies, and weakens the
trust that helps to keep British people
safe. It will affect the UK’s international
reputation for years to come,” they said.
Tom Tugendhat, chairman of the
committee, said that the government’s
failures cost people the chance to flee
Afghanistan, putting their lives in
danger. “The timeline of misery ex-
posed by this report reveals serious sys-
temic failures at the heart of the UK’s
foreign policy,” he said.
A government spokesman said: “Our
staff worked tirelessly to evacuate over
15,000 people from Afghanistan within
a fortnight... We carried out a thor-
ough review to learn lessons from our
withdrawal and have drawn on many of
the findings in our response to the con-
flict in Ukraine.”photo was examined by the police, who
decided that his attendance at the event
did not merit a fixed penalty.
However, some senior Tory MPs
criticised the prime minister, calling the
event in the photos “unjustifiable and
wrong”. Steve Baker, who has urged
Johnson to resign, shared an image of
Covid posters showing a woman breath-
ing through an oxygen mask with a
caption stating: “Look into her eyes and
tell her you never bend the rules.”
Sir Roger Gale, another prominent
critic of Johnson, told Times Radio the
images were damning. “It’s absolutely
clear that there was a party, that he
attended it, that he was raising a toast to
one of his colleagues,” he said. “There-© TIMES NEWSPAPERS LIMITED, 2022.
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e-mail [email protected]Sunny spells and scattered showers,
some heavy and thundery.
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THETIMES.CO.UK/SUBSCRIBE36 more cases
of monkeypox
Monkeypox could
become endemic in
Europe if it makes the
leap into animals,
health officials said. A
further 36 cases of the
virus, which causes a
rash and a fever, were
reported in England,
taking the total to 56.
Scotland reported its
first case. Page 4
Russian deaths
pass milestone
Russia has lost as many
soldiers during the first
three months of the
war in Ukraine as
during the nine years of
the Soviet-Afghan
conflict, according to
British intelligence.
Defence experts say
the conflict in the east
has turned into a “war
of attrition”. Page 13Police to learn
black history
Police will be taught
black history to combat
racism in the ranks
after the head of a
new scrutiny board
urged them to embrace
the label “woke”.
Training will cover
disproportionality in
arrests and the history
of policing black
communities. Page 21IMF head warns
of food crisis
The world economy is
at risk of a food crisis
from unprecedented
supply disruption
caused by the war in
Ukraine, the head of
the International
Monetary Fund,
Kristina Georgieva,
told the World
Economic Forum in
Davos. Page 33Biden: We will
defend Taiwan
President Biden has
said that the US
military would defend
Taiwan against a
Chinese invasion,
contradicting
established policy and
setting out a clear
challenge to Beijing
during his first visit in
office to east Asia.
Page 30
Pence backs
Trump rival
Mike Pence, former
vice-president of the
US, made a late
intervention in
Georgia’s Republican
primary election,
breaking with Donald
Trump to back a rival
candidate as the two
men each consider
running for the White
House in 2024. Page 31COMMENT
If Putin divides the West with a truce, leaving the
Ukrainians feeling betrayed, he will have won
WILLIAM HAGUE, PAGE 25COMMENT 25
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TV & RADIO TIMESDAB RADIO l ONLINE l SMART SPEAKER l APPTo day’s highlights
7.20am9.10am11.40am2pm8pmCatherine West, the shadow foreign
minister
William Hague, former Tory leader,
and the former Labour MP Louise Ellman
Tom Tugendhat, chairman of the foreign
affairs select committee, on the British
withdrawal from Afghanistan
The singer-songwriter Jack Savoretti,
right, on his new album and tour
The writer Sarra Manning on her new
book, London, with Lovefore, he misled us from the dispatch box.
And honourably there is one answer.”
Baroness Davidson of Lundin Links,
a former leader of the Scottish Con-
servatives, said it was clear that John-
son had lied to parliament and his posi-
tion was untenable. “There is now
photographic evidence that when the
prime minister stood up in parliament
and was asked directly was there a party
in No 10 on this date and he replied ‘no’,
he lied,” she told Channel 4 News.
Labour said the images showed there
was “no doubt now” that Johnson had
lied to parliament.
Jo Goodman, co-founder of Covid-
Bereaved Families for Justice, said the
emergence of the photographs would
“twist the knife” into the wounds of
those who had lost loved ones in the
pandemic. “They raise serious ques-tions as to how he has only been issued
with a solitary fine,” she added.
But the Conservative MP Peter Bone
told Times Radio that the photos didn’t
show a party. “I don’t think it looks like
that at all,” he said. “I’m happy to accept
the police’s verdict on it. But we’ve still
got to wait for the Sue Gray report.”
A No 10 spokesman said: “The
Cabinet Office and the Met police have
had access to all information relevant
to their investigations, including
photographs. The Met have concluded
their investigation and Sue Gray will
publish her report in the coming days,
at which point the prime minister will
address parliament in full.”
PM suggested that Gray could
ditch her report, pages 6-
Johnson’s superpower is to trivialise
everything, Hugo Rifkind, page 27continued from page 1
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