Speeches by Dixon.

“Thank you for explaining clearly and in lay terms the different elements of the plan. I know that colleagues will come back to those, but I was really thinking about the headline: are we or are we not on track to deliver the 1.5 million? If not, how many additional courses of treatment have been delivered under the pla…”

“I am trying to get a number in relation to the 1.5 million, but I have not yet heard “We have delivered x”. Have we delivered any additional appointments?”

“In terms of recovery, relative to before the pandemic, some of the data suggests that there are 4.7 million fewer treatments than before the pandemic. We are still way off even recovery, recognising that even before the pandemic, dentistry was in a parlous state.”

“I suppose the other measure is the extent to which people are accessing at all. As we have said, pre-pandemic only half of all people were accessing anyway—we may come on to some of the more fundamental issues with dentistry in general and how they are going to be resolved. We are also seeing dentists continuing to opt…”

“I will leave it to colleagues to follow up on that point, but thank you, Ali.”

“I would like to move on to another element of the recovery plan, which is the uplift in the UDA, or units of dental activity. It was set at £28, I presume with the hope that it would better compensate dentists. What analysis have you done of the impact of the uplift in the UDA?”

“I would like to carry on probing on the way that we are currently paying for dental care. I will also quote the NHS Confederation, which says: “The current NHS dental payment system, based on…UDAs…has led to inefficiencies in both care delivery and budget allocation, with many dental practices avoiding NHS work due to …”

“Procedures.”

“Yes. Obviously, lots of suggestions have been made about dental contract reform, and I am sure we will come on to that—or should we just ditch that and recognise that we need to directly commission community-based health? Would not that be better value for money ultimately and a quicker remedy than doing some of these …”

“But when poor people in deprived areas cannot get registered and cannot be seen on the NHS, do they not effectively become vulnerable patients? They cannot get routine dental care or cannot afford it privately. Maybe you would like to answer this, Dr Wong. It seems that community dental services and urgent dental care …”

“I guess there is a question about value for money. We are probably spending far too little, given that most people are not getting any access. The question is: what, from a very broken system, is the most cost-effective route to getting access for the people who really need it? I suppose we will come back to this, Chai…”

“Yes, I am asking what we have learned and how that is being used.”

“Yes.”

“Some will no doubt be run out of houses, so there is a crossover between domestic and non-domestic. Chair, are you going to pick up some of the issues to do with customers who are in debt?”

“Fine. I will leave that then.”

“But at the moment, those with a disability are not eligible. I do not believe it is linked to attendance allowance, carer’s allowance or the disability personal independence payment.”

“Indeed, but one might otherwise have assumed that they were vulnerable customers so I think it is important that we are clear about which schemes are supporting which type of customer, and who therefore may be left out of some of the energy support schemes.”

“Okay. I am really keen to understand more about the data used previously to identify high-volume customers—for example, data from the NHS about people with chronic conditions or conditions that mean they are higher energy users. That is also true of disabled people and some older people who may be housebound. It is rea…”

“Thank you. The other targeting was around what you understood about the non-domestic sector. In answer to my colleague’s question, you said that, at the start of this, you probably knew least about the non-domestic sector. So what have you learned, and how are you using that data, particularly where we are looking at e…”

“Excuse my ignorance, but could you just explain for the Committee what a heat network is?”