GPs in England have decided to take industrial action over a lack of funding and a decline in care.
The British Medical Association announced the results of its ballot today (1 August), with the result showing 98.3% of the 8,518 GPs who voted saying they are prepared to take part in one or more forms of collective action.
With immediate effect, the BMA is encouraging practices to choose from a list of 10 actions, and practices can choose to implement as few or as many as they think appropriate.
The main action is limiting the number of patients they see each day to 25, a “safe maximum” recommended by the European Union of General Practitioners. The BMA has said it is common for GPs to see more than 30 patients per day .
Other actions include refusing to carry out tests for hospitals, ignoring guidelines on rationing treatments, and withdrawing permission for data-sharing agreements that exclusively use data for secondary purposes
GPs’ working conditions
Dr Katie Bramall-Stainer, chair of BMA’s GP committee for England (GPCE), said: “We had a huge response to this ballot, and the results are clear – GPs are at the end of their tether.
“This is an act of desperation. For too long, we’ve been unable to provide the care we want to. We are witnessing general practice being broken. The era of the family doctor has been wiped out by recent consecutive governments and our patients are suffering as a result.
“There have been countless opportunities to address the funding crisis in general practice, and despite almost 100% of GPs voting to reject the 2024-25 contract earlier this year, still nothing was done. Practices are now struggling to keep the lights on, can’t afford to hire much-needed GPs and other staff, and some have even closed for good.
“The new government is keen to find solutions but the causes of practices closing and GPs leaving remain, these actions will help keep practices open and keep GPs in the NHS workforce so can buy time for [health secretary Wes Streeting] to make the necessary changes that were promised in the Labour Party’s election manifesto.”
The BMA added that, because GPs will be following their working contracts only, collective action can carry on indefinitely if necessary. Historically, practices have worked above and beyond their contracts to keep up with patient demand, while being instructed to offer extra services by NHS England.
Despite warning the government that they are being forced to do more with less, the BMA said that GPs have been repeatedly ignored and not given the funding they need to handle growing pressures.
Of the entire NHS budget, general practices get only 6% of guaranteed funding. The GPCE believes this needs to gradually increase by 1% per year, to 15%, while protecting existing funding across the wider system.
Streeting tweeted on X: “We inherited an absurd situation, where patients can’t get a GP appointment, and GPs can’t get a job. We’re taking immediate action to recruit an extra 1,000 GPs. I want to work with GPs to rebuild the NHS together.”
Earlier this week, chancellor Rachel Reeves confirmed that junior doctors would receive a 22.3% pay rise, putting an end to months of strikes.
The BMA also said the government had accepted a recommendation from the Review Body on Doctors’ and Dentists’ remuneration of a 6% pay rise.
However, GPs remain in dispute with the government over levels of funding to practices, which determine staff salaries and practices’ ability to deliver appointments efficiently and manage patients.
GPs received only a 4.1% uplift in Reeves’ announcement this week, having been awarded 1.9% via core practice contracts in April.
Commenting on the award earlier this week, Bramall-Stainer said GPs were “deeply disappointed”.
“An underfunded contract has consequences for running costs, wider staff salaries and the ability to hire additional unemployed GPs to deliver more appointments. Without adequate funding, this will mean that some surgeries will have to close.
“We’ve had positive conversations with the new health secretary, but the last government forced us to ballot for collective action.
“We very much look forward to Mr Streeting working with us to give our profession the resources it needs so we can start to rebuild general practice, and help the government fulfil their manifesto commitment to bring back the family doctor.”
This article has been updated with the result of the BMA ballot. Additional reporting by Rob Moss.
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