The Yorkshire Post has won support from parliament for its fight to stop patients being denied access to NHS dental care.

An Early Day Motion welcoming the Post's Stop the Rot campaign has been tabled by Greg Mulholland, Liberal Democrats MP for Leeds North West.

The campaign calls for the Government to modernise dentists' contracts to keep existing practitioners in the NHS, to keep NHS fees for patients affordable and to expand training at dental schools in Leeds and Sheffield.

And, tabling the EDM, the MP also urged other regional and local media around the country to support similar campaigns.

The Post's fight follows a survey by the paper which showed that only 16 per cent of dentists in Yorkshire are taking on new fee-paying adult NHS patients, and in some parts of the county no dentists are registering new patients.

Head of content Andrew Vine said: "In the past year the number of NHS dentists accepting new NHS patients has fallen through the floor.

"In 2004 28 per cent were taking on new patients but this has dropped to 16 per cent."

Since launching the campaign in May the Post has carried dozens of stories about readers who have to travel miles to find a dentist and about dentists who are leaving the NHS to go private because they say the NHS fees they receive are too low.