DAUK’s GP Committee has backed the BMA and the vote by GPs in England to enter into dispute with the Government.
The BMA GP committee in England (GPC England) has voted to go back into dispute with the Government, Department of Health and Social Care, and NHS England from 1 October 2025.
Dr Steve Taylor, DAUK’s GP co-lead, said: “DAUK supports the BMA decision and shares the concerns of the wider GP community expressed by BMA.
Frontline GPs
“The Government has failed to listen to concerns from GPs. In particular, GPs who continue to work on the frontline are not being heard.
“The most important thing being missed is genuine patient care while focusing on access.
“GPs care about patients first but are not able to provide the care they need.
“Top-down impositions from Government and NHS England, without the resources, are a recipe for disaster.
“Also a one-size-fits-all solution won’t work, as urban parts of the country are so different from rural areas.
Listen to concerns
“It is vital that Wes Streeting and NHS leaders listen to concerns and don’t get into a fight with the very people who have provided 20% more appointments with less money and who want it to work better.”
Changes to the GP contract are due to come into effect next month. They are intended to ‘free up’ the surgery phone lines to ‘end the 8am scramble’ enabling patients to make online consultation requests for non-urgent problems and queries, from 8am in the morning to 6.30pm in the evening, Monday to Friday.
However, online systems cannot distinguish between non-urgent and urgent patient queries. GPs fear this could lead to potentially serious problems being missed when the important ‘needles’ get lost inside the huge haystack of unmet patient need.
Overstretched GPs
The BMA’s GP Committee believes allowing unlimited online requests without safety measures built in opens the floodgates to an already stretched GP workforce without increasing any practice capacity.
In the first instance, GPC England will consider if any action could be taken to challenge the lawfulness of the Government’s position on necessary safety measures.
Committee chair Dr Katie Bramall said: “We know that the public’s number one NHS priority is general practice, so it’s disappointing to see the Government being prepared to risk patient safety, practice workforce wellbeing and GP retention, when solving this would not cost a single penny.
“GPs have a track record of being the first to embrace and embed technology in the NHS so long as it’s safe and fit for purpose, but imposing such changes on general practice, ignoring our repeated warnings will do the opposite of ‘bringing back the family doctor’.
All is not lost
“But all is not lost – we still have time in the coming days for Government to meet us halfway.
“We will explore all options, but I’m sure our patients and the profession would rather we find a resolution in the coming days. We want to work with the Government in delivering an NHS that we know is safe.”
DAUK committee members are all volunteers and campaign on issues facing frontline doctors in their own time. Please support our work by joining DAUK or donating to our GoFundMe.
