The BMA in Wales has agreed a flu outbreak DES with the Welsh government in the wake of the growing number of flu cases, the chair of the Wales GP Committee announced today.
Dr Charlotte Jones told GPs at the Welsh LMCs Conference that negotiations on the contract for 2018/19 were ongoing, and included ’positive changes’ regarding indemnity, workload issues and ‘last man standing’ liabilities.
She also said that the BMA was releasing a review of the GMS contract by April 2019, ahead of a potential overhaul.
Dr Jones said the review takes forward some of the challenges that ’deserve time to ensure they are resolved once and for all.’
As part of the contract changes for 2018/19, she said GPs should see a contract uplift.
Alongside this, there would be:
- An improvement to the current indemnity offer whilst a permanent solution is found to adjust rates to cover rising indemnity costs;
- Measures to cut GP practice workload;
- Revisions to QOF, with proposals to ‘include moving to just disease areas in active QOF and removal of the prescriptive detail in the cluster domain’.
- Incentives to retain current senior partners and attract new partners which would incorporate individualised ‘packages’ and improved returner / retainer schemes.
Dr Jones said: ’We are still in the process of negotiating and finalising the specifics of these areas but am sure you will agree these are important areas to tackle and give hope to the profession that we are cognisant of, and addressing, the issues which are much wider than just the contract.’
However, she added that there were still huge pressures facing GPs in Wales, adding ’there are still large numbers of practices facing sustainability issues and worse, deciding there is no other option but to hand back their contract’.
