A BMA GPC negotiator has said that the 2022/23 changes to the GP contract have been imposed without the agreement of the trade union.
Under the changes, primary care networks will be required to provide a full range of services from 9am to 5pm on Saturdays as part of the Network DES.
BMA GPC executive member and Doncaster GP Dr Dean Eggitt has said that the BMA GPC executive team ‘did not agree’ to the changes.
The current contract was implemented in 2019/20, and was meant for five years. However, there was to be negotiated incremental changes every year.
But Dr Eggitt said on Twitter: ‘Due to the failure of NHSEI to recognise GP workload and its impact upon patient safety, there will be no negotiated GP contract agreement for 2022-23.
‘NHSEI has chosen to implement the contract without any additional support for safe patient care.’
Another BMA GPC executive member Dr Richard Van Mellaerts said NHS England’s decision to apply changes without agreement from the GPC was ‘deeply disappointing’.
He said there was ‘no recognition of massive pressures in GP, huge patient backlog, increased costs of NI contributions’, meaning ‘patient care will be impacted’.
Dr Van Mellaerts added that NHS England had given the GPC Executive team ‘less than two hours notice of their letter, which was then trailed on WhatsApp’.
The Network DES is separate to the main contract, and these changes signal a shift in requirements for the vast majority of practices that are part of a PCN.
The BMA had said it would ‘leave no stone unturned in trying to find an agreed way forward’.
It also said that the current contract was not ‘fit for purpose’, and negotiators will meet with LMCs and GPs to seek views on a general practice model that is ‘fit for the future’.
Meanwhile, the BMA previously clarified that it is not seeking to renegotiate the current five-year GP contract, outside of the usual annual amendments, following a statement that suggested this might be the case.
READERS' COMMENTS [7]
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No won’t be doing it and it they want the contract back they can have it.
Well the BMAs strategy of resetting the relationship with NHSE has been a tremendous success as we start next year with even worse T+Cs
You signed up. Like herded sheep. Final bit of advice. Opt out.
Battered and bruised. We stepped up stretched and adapted every which way possible- even before the pandemic. We can’t recruit for love nor money. No one wants partnership and the list size keeps growing. 6 GP sessions a day with pharmacists, nurse/HCA, social prescriber bulking out the rest of the lists for 14000 patients . As much administrative staff as we can muster.. 2 retired partners holding on and now this. It’s a house of cards- now I’m so ready to go. When you ask people to run a marathon everyday it doesn’t matter how much money you throw at the race- the runners are on their knees.
The BMA has consistently refused even to think about alternatives to the NHS, and repeatedly stated it’s undying loyalty to the NHS.
If you have nowhere else to go, and you have repeatedly told everyone that you have nowhere else to go, then you have a very weak negotiating position.
Not so much negotiating with one hand tied, more negotiating whilst gagged, trussed hand and foot, tied to a very large rock, at the bottom of a very deep dark hole.
35 days to go.
Not that I’m counting, of course.
Let’s go private BMA. The NHS is not fit for purpose.