The Chair of the Principal Executive Committee used his address to BDA Conference in Manchester to outline key strategic priorities for the BDA, including a focus on dental regulation, contracts and workforce morale.
The speech follows on from a dramatic year for the profession, which saw the government forced to backtrack on a £2,000 pay cut for foundation dentists, and the General Dental Council pulled up in front of the House of Common’s Health Committee for a scrutiny hearing.
Speaking on polling day for the UK General Election, Mick Armstrong said:
“In this general election campaign you might have thought you missed the debate on dentistry. Well you didn’t, because there wasn’t one. Put simply when politicians talk about health they don’t mean oral health. When they bang on about ‘whole person care’, that ‘whole person’ doesn’t have teeth.
“What this means is we can’t be the quiet profession any longer. Sitting back, on the fence or on the side-lines will not cut it. If politicians have been unresponsive to our issues, it’s up to us to change that, and get out there, set agendas and lead debates.
“It’s time to put oral health where it belongs. We are not asking for special pleading, just for dentistry to be part of the discussion. It’s time to address the nation’s addiction to sugar; tackle health inequalities and put prevention at the heart of policy – especially in contract reform; for the profession’s and patients’ sake, let’s fix dental regulation.
“The BDA has always been in the business of change, and in the next parliament we will be even clearer on that purpose. Our world is as it is, but it doesn’t have to be. We have to draw a line on shoddy regulation, on contracts that aren’t fit for purpose, on declining morale in our profession and the priority that’s been given to oral health.
“Already we’ve shown what we can do. We stopped the planned £2,000 pay cut for foundation dentists. We made Westminster wake up to the problems at the GDC. And I know we couldn’t have accomplished any of this without our members behind us.
“Our people are what make the BDA. And what will continue to drive it in the five years of this coming parliament.”