Rachel Gilmour

My constituency, which straddles the Devon-Somerset border, has a disproportionately elderly population. We have perhaps even greater and more regular healthcare needs than some other parts of the country, but significant funding shortfalls have hit GP practices particularly hard. In the coastal west Somerset area, we have what are termed dental deserts. The percentage of adults in my constituency seen in the last two years by a dentist falls well under the national average. A&E departments see the effects of that down the line. The failure to treat ailments at an earlier stage often leads to conditions deteriorating and to serious complications, leaving A&E departments overwhelmed. Let us not kid ourselves: the strains on A&E capacity are downstream from the insufficiency of GP and dental services, whose raison d’être is to provide routine and preventive care. We need a systemic overhaul to shore up GP and dental services so that they are fit to tackle the problems at their onset and remove some of the pressure on accident and emergency. I am all too aware that healthcare professionals tend to practise where they trained, so we want to swell the ranks of our nurses, doctors and dentists in Tiverton and Minehead by providing locally based training colleges. In Tiverton and Minehead, we also have a shortage of pharmacies. Let us be clear: this is about essential medication. Finally, I have often talked about the lack of transport facilities in my constituency. The paucity of healthcare provision across my constituency coupled with the significant shortcomings in public transport creates a bleak picture indeed.