EAST Lancashire's dental crisis was being raised in Parliament today by a worried MP who revealed a man was forced to walk a round trip of 14 miles just to receive treatment.

Rossendale and Darwen MP Janet Anderson said she was shocked when she received the letter from constituent David Walsh, of Naze Court, Newchurch, who had to walk to a neighbouring authority for help on Boxing Day, when there was no public transport.

Mr Walsh ended up at a surgery in Rochdale with an abscess and Mrs Anderson said: "It highlights a very real problem and today I will be asking questions directly of the Junior Minister of Health Hazel Blears, MP for Salford."

When she asked for figures of people registered with East Lancashire dentists Mrs Anderson discovered that for the three months up to September more than 15,000 fewer people were on dentists' lists than the three months before -- and the majority of those are people in Rossendale no longer able to find an NHS dentist.

She said: "I knew there was a problem, but I had no idea it was this big."

Mrs Anderson is taking forward a four point plan on how the Government could help improve access to dental services in East Lancashire compiled by health authority consultant in Dental Public Health Dr Gary Whittle.

He suggests:

Introducing fluoridation of public water supplies, which would reduce dental decay by up to 50 per cent.

Increase the provision of salaried dental services in Rossendale.

Train dental undergraduates in Lancashire.

Direct dentists to struggling areas for vocational training.

David Walsh, 42, was forced to walk the 14-mile round trip. Mr Walsh, who is unemployed and registered disabled with mental health problems, was told he had an abscess by Burnley General Hospital in November and was given a date to see a consultant specialist in February.

On Boxing Day it erupted and he was forced to walk to the emergency dental clinic in Rochdale. He had no money to pay for taxi.

He said: "NHS provision of dental care round here is almost non-existent. All the dentists are private. It's disgraceful."

Currently only 49 per cent of the population nationally is registered with an NHS dentist, while only 45 per cent in East Lancashire has one.

Even patients prepared to pay for private treatment are struggling to find a dentist.

There are 159 dentists in the area, in 82 practices, with just 17 practices prepared to take on new NHS cases.

In the last two years two major dental practices in Rossendale have gone private claiming the NHS did not allow them enough time to treat patients properly.

They also said treatments were restricted by financial constraints imposed by the NHS.

Those two practices are now treating fewer people.

She is also pressing for a dental school to be opened in the region so that student dentists will be encouraged to take up trainee posts within in East Lancashire.

She is being backed in her comments by Hyndburn MP Greg Pope who told Mrs Anderson the problem in Haslingden was huge.

Mrs Anderson said another constituent had written to her from Loveclough because she had tried to get treatment for her son and had been told the nearest NHS dentist was in Accrington but his list closed in 2002.

Dr Whittle said: "The underlying problem with NHS dentistry in East Lancashire is the shortage of dentists willing to come forward in this part of the world.

"The problem has been compounded by the reduction of dentists in training since the 1980s.

"The introduction of vocational training in the 1990s means that the first job for many dental graduates is close to the university where they train and this gives the practices involved in that training an advantage in obtaining new dentists.

"Last year the three large practices in Haslingden, Rawtenstall and Waterfoot, all owned by the same partners, decided that the only way to reduce their workloads was to privatise.

"The effect of this has been to overwhelm the other six practices to the point where they are unable to take on any new NHS patients."