GP leaders in Northern Ireland will consider demanding at least 10% of the health budget, as they argue that the current level of funding is ‘making general practice sick’.
Representatives from Northern Ireland’s LMCs will meet in Belfast for their annual conference on Saturday (16 November) to debate issues including funding, indemnity and practice sustainability.
They will vote on a motion asking that the Department of Health increases funding for general practice to a ‘minimum’ of 10% of the health budget – up from 5.4% currently.
It comes as GPs in Northern Ireland have experienced a real-terms funding cut of nearly 2.5% in the past year, with the BMA warning this has made it ‘harder for practices to stay open’.
The LMCs conference agenda also includes a motion, not scheduled for debate, demanding that the Government fund GMS services per patient to ‘value more than that costed for an annual subscription to Petplan for a hamster’. (*Note: Petplan has clarified to Pulse it does not offer cover for hamsters.)
According to the Northern Ireland Audit Office, the total cost of services provided under the GMS contract was around £375 million in 2022-23 – the equivalent to around 5.4% of overall health and social care spend in Northern Ireland.
With over two million registered patients in Northern Ireland (as of October 2022), this equates to only £185 per patient per year.
The conference will also vote on whether to instruct NI GPC to demand that the Government ringfence recurrent and not repurposed indemnity funding for all GPs including salaried and locums ‘in order to better attract and retain GPs in Northern Ireland’.
Earlier this month, the NI Government announced that it will provide £3.4m in funding to both GMS and GP out-of-hours services to support practices to ‘increase their capacity’ to meet the ‘anticipated growth in demand’ over the winter.
But the BMA warned that this level of funding ‘will only begin to address the huge gaps in service’ that patients are facing in Northern Ireland and called for long-term solutions to address this.
It comes as Northern Ireland’s GPs are still waiting for confirmation from the Government on whether the 6% pay uplift recommended by the doctors’ pay review body will be paid in full.
The motions in full
Indemnity
That conference instructs NIGPC to demand that DoH/SPPG ring fence recurrent and not repurposed indemnity funding for all GPs including salaried and locums in order to better attract and retain GPs in Northern Ireland.
Funding
That conference believes that the current NHS GMS contract is making general practice sick and demands that DoH acts to increase funding for general practice to minimum of 10% of the health budget.
That conference directs NIGPC to use all available means including the ICO or NIPSO to get aggregated information on the quantum of GMS monies that are taken to support Trust-run practices, and separately CICrun practices.
GP registrars
That conference notes with dismay the delayed engagement from NI government with resident doctors in their contract negotiations, and demands that Department of Health and the Health Minister engage urgently with this branch of practice.
Primary and secondary care interface
That conference notes with some caution the introduction of advice and discharge as a mechanism for trust colleagues to triage referral and directs NIGPC to engage with Department and Trusts to rapidly produce regional standards on how this should operate.
Source: BMA NI
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