General practice does not have the capacity to meet the needs of all patients, DAUK’s GP committee has told national radio listeners.
Dr Steve Taylor, GP spokesperson for the Doctors Association UK (DAUK), reiterated our call for more investment in general practice.
Speaking on LBC News, Dr Taylor said general practice had effectively had a one-fifth cut in funding in the past decade.
This had led to GPs being unemployed or underemployed, while demand for general practice was rising.
Unemployed GPs
He said: “The biggest problem is we don’t have the capacity for all the requests and needs of patients.
“GP practices have effectively had a 20 per cent funding cut over the past eight or nine years, which means there are currently unemployed GPs or GPs doing less work than they would otherwise do if the funding was there.
“We could have a lot more access to GPs if the funding was made available.
“The Government has talked about moving care from hospitals into the community, but the money has to be there so we can employ some of those GPs.
“I’m campaigning to get more money into general practice.
Access to GPs
“I would love to see more access to GPs.”
Dr Taylor was discussing new figures which showed a third (33.3%) of GP appointments in England were carried out on the phone or online.
According to new analysis of NHS England data by the PA news agency, the figure was up from 30.9% in June 2024, and 28.3% in June 2023.
Dr Taylor said the figures did not show that the total number of appointments in each year has also risen.
“You’ve got a bigger proportion that are not face-to-face,” he said. “But actually, you’ve also got more face-to-face appointments in GP surgeries up and down the country.
GP appointments
“I’m not entirely sure what the problem is with telephone and e-consults anyway.
“I have been a GP for 30 years, and we’ve adapted to people’s needs over that time.
“I’m also a patient. I’ve had two telephone consultations with my GP in the past two weeks, which were entirely appropriate.
“There’s two pictures. The first is that face-to-face appointments aren’t falling off, they’re actually going up every year.
“Secondly, telephone and e-consults are also going up and are good, so I’m not sure what the issue is.”
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