The Chair welcomed the panellists, Members and the public to the meeting. She outlined the format of the meeting, how it would work in practice and reminded all parties to be polite and respectful to each other at all times.

She advised that as the special meeting was being held jointly with the External Overview and Scrutiny Committee of Torridge District Council, both Committees would need to address their formal items on the agenda front pages prior to opening the meeting for joint discussion.

NORTH DEVON COUNCIL – CONSIDERATION OF ITEMS 1 TO 4 ON THE AGENDA:

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Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Bulled, P. Leaver and Williams.

Please telephone the Corporate and Community Services team to prepare a form for your signature before the meeting. Interests must be re-declared when the item is called. A declaration of interest under the Code of Conduct will be a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest, an Other Registrable Interest or a Non-Registrable Interest.  If the item directly relates to your interest you must declare the interest and leave the room for the item, save in the case of Other Registrable Interests or Non-Registrable Interests where you may first speak on the item as a member of the public if provision has been made for the public to speak.  If the matter does not directly relate to your interest but still affects it then you must consider whether you are affected to a greater extent than most people and whether a reasonable person would consider your judgement to be clouded, if you are then you must leave the room for the item (although you may speak as a member of the public if provision has been made for the public to speak) or, if you are not, then you can declare the interest but still take part).

There were no declarations of interest announced.

TORRIDGE DISTRICT COUNCIL – CONSIDERATION OF ITEMS 1 TO 4 ON THE AGENDA:

The Chair of the External Overview and Scrutiny Committee of Torridge Distract Council took her Committee through items one to four on their agenda.

NOTE: Appendices A to D (attached) provide responses to set questions that were sent to the panellists to seek their views prior to the publication of this agenda).

The Committee collectively noted the responses to the pre-submitted questions under item 5 on the agenda at appendices A-D.

The Chair introduced Councillor Patrinos to the special meeting and invited him to address the Committee.

Councillor Patrinos outlined the proposed format for the meeting, identified the reasons behind the calling of the special meeting, which involved addressing public concerns regarding the lack of dental provision at local level.

He outlined the following key points to the special meeting:

·       Securing a dentist, especially an NHS one, was extremely difficult.

·       To better understand the problem both District Councils decided to meet jointly to discuss any potential solutions to the ongoing problem.

·       Both Committees fully appreciated that as local district Councils the commissioning of dental provision was not a responsibility that sat within their remit.

·       As district Councillors they regularly responded to the concerns expressed to them by their constituents.

·       There were many heart breaking stories, which all seemed to follow the same pattern:

Ø  Many people had no dentist. 

Ø  Some with children as old as 8 that had never seen a dentist.

Ø  Members of the local community who had moved to Devon from other parts of the country regularly had to travel to their previous dentists in other parts of the UK to receive ongoing treatment.

·       This was not just a local but also a national problem.

·       The aim of the special meeting was to better understand the causes of this growing problem and to identify ways in which local district councils could potentially provide assistance.

·       The invited panel consisted of three experts and whilst other representatives from NHS Devon and Healthwatch were invited, they were unfortunately unable to attend.

·       The fourth panellist representing Mydentist, which owned a number of dental practices across the UK initially agreed to attend. However, two days prior to the special meeting the Clerk to the Policy Development Committee at North Devon Council was advised that they were no longer able to attend the special meeting. They were however happy to answer any questions by email, which the Clerk would facilitate after the meeting.

Each Member of the panel was invited to introduce themselves and provide a brief overview of their role together with their employment background.

The Policy Development Committee members of North Devon Council asked follow up questions of the panellists and received the following responses:

1. A figure of £2b had been quoted to get the dental provision back to where it should be, was this a true figure?

Ø  Partner at Torrington Dental Practice/Associate Professor of Primary Care Dentistry, Peninsula Dental School: In terms of the contract, £2.9 billion was currently spent on NHS dentistry in the United Kingdom. However, that was only sufficient to fund dentistry for half of the population of England, and it didn’t reach those in greatest need.

Ø  Specialist Orthodontist, (Bude): The current level of manpower and funding in NHS dentistry could not provide the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 28.

The Vice Chair advised that he had made a summary of the key points from the discussions held and the Committee would consider these alongside the formal minutes at the next meeting of the Committee.

The Chair of the External Overview and Scrutiny Committee, Torridge District Council thanked the panellists for their attendance at the meeting and their openness in the discussions of the issues and spoke of her desire to work together to see improvements going forward.

The Chair of the Policy Development Committee, North Devon Council thanked the officers involved in attendance at the meeting. She also thanked the Corporate and Community Services officer for her support during the meeting and the Clerk to the Committee for her hard work behind the scenes to facilitate the arrangements in the run up to the meeting.