(NO. 123.) SECOND READING. (Hansard, 27 June 1878)

§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE

, in moving that the Bill be now read a second time, said, its object was to effect an arrangement by which the public would have some security that persons calling themselves dentists, and practising as such, were qualified; and the way they proposed to set to work was by establishing a system of registration something like that which existed in regard to the Medical Profession. The persons who would be entitled to have their names placed on the register would be, in the first instance, licentiates in dental surgery of any Royal College of Surgeons in England, in Edinburgh, or in Ireland, and of any University in the United Kingdom, or of the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons in Glasgow. In addition they proposed to protect the interests of existing practitioners in dentistry, either as a separate profession or in conjunction with the practices of medicine, surgery, or pharmacy, by enabling anybody who was now in bonâ fide practice to be put on the register on making a proper declaration. The Bill had received a good deal of support from the profession, and it had been favourably viewed by the General Medical Council, under whose supervision the examinations would take place. He, therefore, hoped their Lordships would give the Bill a second reading. The Medical Act of the noble Duke (the Duke of Richmond and Gordon) dealt with the subject of dentistry, though not so fully as his Bill; but he was glad to believe the objects the Government had in view were very much the same as his own, and provided certain Amendments in regard to the machinery of the registration were accepted, he understood the noble Duke was prepared to view his Bill favourably. He proposed to put the Bill for Committee to-morrow (Friday), with a view to the Amendments being inserted, and its being reprinted. The noble Duke and their Lordships would then be able to see how the Bill stood in its complete shape.