Chancellor to implement OFT report
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- Published: Tuesday, 08 December 2015 07:37
- Written by News Editor
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The Chancellor, George Osborne, has published a policy paper aimed at boosting competition to bring down bills for households. In it he says he intends to implement some of the provisions of the 2012 OFT report including time-limited NHS contracts open to any qualified provider, more transparent price lists in dental practices and an end to patients being misled over what is available under NHS dental contracts.
The Treasury and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills have jointly published a policy paper titled ‘A better deal: boosting competition to bring down bills for families and firms’ which is aimed at improving productivity in the UK as a priority. It says: ‘It is the government’s responsibility to help foster the right conditions for competition and investment across the UK. This means removing barriers – including unnecessary regulation – that stop small and innovative businesses from growing and exploiting market opportunities’.
On dentistry it observes: ‘Pricing for dentistry can be opaque and confusing. The government will ensure that dentist treatment plans and price lists are clear and easily accessible, empowering patients in England to make the best choices.’
The Government has plans for reforming the NHS dental contract in England.
‘The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) found the dentistry market in England to be subject to rigid regulatory controls that dictate who can enter the market and where, restricting innovation and patient choice. The government believes that there are opportunities to improve both efficiency and competition in the provision of dental services and will be carefully considering the issue of non-time limited dental contracts as part of broader work on contract reform’.
The Government is also keen on improving transparency in NHS dental services in England.
‘A 2012 OFT report into dentistry found that around 500,000 patients each year may be provided with inaccurate information by their dentist regarding their entitlement to receive particular dental treatments through the NHS. The government will ensure that dental patients in England have access to the information they need to make the right decisions about their dental care, by asking NHS England to reinforce the existing contractual requirement to ensure patients understand NHS treatment and prices, and to further improve the information available through NHS Choices by spring 2016. These changes will empower patients to make the best and most affordable choices for them.’
The Office of Fair Trading (OFT as it was then) published a report in 2012 on the whole dentistry market. Some of its key recommendations were:
- Reform of the NHS dental contract in England to facilitate greater competition. In the OFT’s view, it is vital that the Department of Health progresses the redesign of the NHS dental contract and, in doing so, that it ensures that the principles of patient choice and the facilitation of entry into the dentistry market by new dental practices and expansion by higher performing dental practices are given due consideration when developing the new NHS dental contract.
- One option which the OFT would urge the Department of Health to consider is introducing a system in which ‘any qualified provider’ may deliver NHS services to dental patients and where NHS dental payments follow the patient.
- The OFT strongly considers that the Department of Health must also, when redesigning the new NHS dental contract, bring an end to non-time-limited NHS dental contracts.
- The OFT considers that the commissioning process for NHS dental contracts in England should also be streamlined and standardised to facilitate entry into the market by new dental practices.
- Appropriate, immediate steps should be taken to improve patient awareness of existing online tools which enable patients to find local dentists who provide NHS dental treatment, such as the NHS Choices website. We also strongly recommend that the content of these online tools be expanded significantly to improve their utility to patients.
- The OFT urges NHS commissioning bodies and regulators of dental practices, such as the CQC, to be far more proactive in ensuring that dental practices comply with existing rules which require them to display NHS dental treatment prices and to provide patients with clear information about proposed dental treatment, including the cost, prior to receiving dental treatment.
- We also call on the GDC to expand their professional standards to require that indicative prices of private dental treatment are consistently displayed.
- NHS commissioning bodies must also be far more proactive in identifying and taking robust, timely and regular enforcement action against dental practices that provide inaccurate information to patients regarding their entitlement to certain NHS dental treatments.
- The OFT considers that the dental complaints system must be reformed to make it simpler, easier and less time consuming for dental patients and dentists to lodge and respond to complaints that have not been satisfactorily resolved at the dental practice level. The OFT strongly recommends that either a single body should be responsible for dealing with such complaints, or a single patient-facing portal for the reporting of such complaints should be developed to ensure a more effective, efficient and consistent complaints system.
Previous GDPUK news on this
OFT to investigate dentistry http://www.gdpuk.com/news/latest-news/854-oft-to-investigate-dentistry-both-nhs-and-private
OFT calls for more choice http://www.gdpuk.com/news/latest-news/1027-oft-calls-for-more-choice-and-competition-in-dentistry
OFT report analysis http://www.gdpuk.com/news/latest-news/1028-oft-report-analysis
Govt responds to OFT http://www.gdpuk.com/news/latest-news/1091-government-responds-to-oft-report
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