DENTISTS have claimed a hike in their fees will make it more difficult for patients to get appointments on the NHS.

An alliance of dentists, including a group that covers Chorley , is set to rebel against their own regulator, the General Dental Council (GDC), due to a 'loss of faith' in the organisation.

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The Central Lancashire Local Dental Committee (LDC) is among dozens of local groups to raise serious concerns about the regulator's decision to increase its fees by more than 50 per cent, from £576 to £890 per year.

Chairman Mike Jolly said: "We are now facing a potentially very serious problem for NHS dentistry and morale is very low in the profession. If the retention fee continues to rise for dentists, as well as their indemnity costs, such as insurance against lawsuits and GDC investigations, it may become uneconomic to see NHS patients."

However, he stressed the main concern is around 'inefficiencies' at the GDC, complaining of slow complaints handling, a lack of accountability and a heavy-handed approach when it comes to investigating complaints.

The East Lancashire committee was not among 73 local groups that have called for a review of the fees increase, and was not available for comment before our deadline.

The GDC said the fee increase is the first in four years, and followed a nine week consultation exercise which gained 4,000 responses. It said the fee was linked directly to the 'very significant increase' to the fitness to practise case-load experienced by the regulator over the last three years.

Chief executive and registrar, Evlynne Gilvarry, added: "We will continue to seek efficiencies in the way we work but significant savings will require wholesale change of our outdated legislation. We will continue to press vigorously for a completely new legal framework, and meanwhile, we are working to achieve a significant interim legislative change which will improve the way we deal with cases at an early stage and reduce costs."