A resident has contacted Nub News to say he has been asked to pay over £400 have his teeth cleaned even before he will be accepted onto any dental plan for treatment.

The individual chose to go to a private dentist when no NHS dentist was available, and to go onto an installment plan to pay.

But he was not at the time aware that he would first pay hundreds of pounds to start.

The desperate lack of local dental care has been highlighted this week by the queue of patients in Bristol trying to get onto an NHS listed dental practice.

Today (February 7) the government announced that it is going to incentivise dentists to start up in poorly served areas for NHS treatment, although it is not clear where they will be.

Dentists are going to be offered a so called golden hello payment of up to £20,000 to work in dental deserts.

It has been estimated that around a million people have not seen a dentist for two or more years.

Across Somerset the challenge of finding an NHS dentist has been described as dire - HERE