Sir, I just received my Annual Retention Fee (ARF) renewal communication from the GDC with its most helpful attached Q&A section. I must express my amazed opinion that something designed to justify the large hike in the ARF, managed to do precisely the opposite.

Stating that the major cause of the fee rise is the large increase in 'fitness to practise' hearings it then later says that the number of those found lacking as a result of these hearings was so very small that they could not possibly make up any financial shortfall; this is having your cake and eating it on a Great British Bake Off scale. It goes on to state that these wrongdoers amounted to 'only 0.001%' of the dentists on the register, revealing top down failure and mathematical incompetence to match the arrogant hypocrisy of earlier. By my rough calculation this percentage would equate to about 40% of one single dentist; this based on a figure of 40,000 dentists on the Register obtained by phone just now (be warned this figure could be incorrect!).

I believe that the GDC approach to the regulation of our profession is the source of many woes: for the many dentists who are caught up in the many unwieldy, deeply unpleasant and expensive hearings that seem to come to nothing; for patients with genuine grievances (rather than the unpleasant, bonkers or just plain vindictive ones); for the profession asked to pay hard earned money to the unfit incompetent organisation that is charged with policing it.

Presumably this year's ARF communication was written with the difficult dento-political environment in mind – maybe with the aim of restoring some confidence in the Council prior to its day in court? That this must all have been examined and given clearance from the very top of the organisation seems to provide ample reason for a head or two to roll.

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