The Government has published the 2024/25 GP contract directions, including the increase to global sum that will come into effect on 1 April.
The new global sum figure for England’s GP practices has been calculated as £107.57 per registered patient, before Carr-Hill and London weighting, up from £104.73.
This was last increased in October last year, when it went up from £102.28 to £104.73 per patient, in order to finance a 6% staff uplift.
As a whole, the Government is increasing GP funding by £259m, taking overall contract investment to £11,186m – a 2.23% increase.
This incorporates a 2% pay increase for GPs and staff, which may change based on the independent pay review body recommendations.
This year’s GP contract is being imposed on practices in England without an agreement from the BMA’s GP Committee, which had asked for an 8.7% core contract uplift.
GPCE chair Dr Katie Bramall-Stainer has said that it renders the GP business model ‘non-viable’ and will lead to ‘reduced patient access’ as well as ‘likely’ practice closures.
The Government has said it will reconsider its GP funding uplift offer once the Review Body on Doctors’ and Dentists’ Remuneration (DDRB) makes a recommendation in ‘the coming months’.
A referendum of GP members of the BMA on whether they ‘accept’ the 2024/25 GP contract closed yesterday, with headline results expected today.
Closing the Pulse LIVE London conference with a keynote speech yesterday, Dr Bramall-Stainer revealed that the referendum ‘reached 27,000 GPs’.
It is not a formal trade union ballot but a ‘temperature check’ of the profession, which will inform future formal ballots on potential collective action by GPs in protest at the Government’s successive contract impositions.
The BMA has set out an ‘approximate timeline’ for the plans, which could see ‘collective action’ start in late November or early December, aimed at coinciding with a UK general election.
READERS' COMMENTS [2]
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I would like to thank Dr Amanda Doyle OBE for publishing her new contract. However, would she please explain the relevance of the “GDP deflator” to rising staff salaries and energy bills, for those like me who had never heard of it before.
“GDP deflator”? – I think that’s the mechanism that NHSE accountants use to counteract GP flatus for when GPs receive news of their latest contract offering…