Labour to incentivise GPs to ‘bring back the family doctor’ | GPs

Labour would provide incentives for GPs to allow patients to see a particular doctor, and seek to regulate NHS managers like medical professionals, the party has said in its latest round of proposed changes to the health system.

Setting out the ideas in comments to two newspapers, Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, reiterated his call for the NHS to be more responsive to patient needs, an approach that has already seen him clash with the main doctors’ union.

Writing for the Telegraph, Streeting said Labour would “bring back the family doctor”, meaning patients would be able to see the same GP for each appointment if they wanted.

Surgeries in England would receive financial incentives for doing this – but with the plan described as being “cost neutral”, it would also involve GP practices being given less money if they were unable to offer such continuity.

“GPs value this relationship with their patients,” Streeting wrote. “Give GPs the tools to build a meaningful relationship with patients and more will stay in the job.”

The plan, and especially the idea that some surgeries would lose financing, could place Streeting on a collision course with doctors’ associations again, following criticism from the British Medical Association after he accused the union of opposing vital NHS reforms.

Streeting said in the Telegraph that while the NHS existed to serve patients, “increasingly, patients are instead made to bend their lives to suit the health service”.

He wrote: “Patients are mainly told when their appointment will be and whether it will be in person, over the phone, or via video, rather than choosing what works best for them. Why should someone who prefers to see their GP face-to-face have to make do with a phone call?

“A public service shouldn’t be telling the public, ‘Like it or lump it.’”

Predicting there would be more opposition from doctors’ organisations, Streeting accepted that GP practices faced increasing pressures, but said Labour would alleviate this by training more doctors and by providing community-based care, which would ease the burden on family doctors.

In separate comments to the Times, Streeting raised the idea of regulating NHS managers in the same way as medical staff, meaning those found to have seriously failed could be struck off a professional register.

Streeting said the murders of babies committed by Lucy Letby, with some doctors at the Chester hospital where she worked claiming their concerns about the neonatal nurse were overruled by managers, made the change necessary.

He told the Times: “The appalling murders at the Countess of Chester hospital are not the first time whistleblowers have been ignored, when listening to their warnings could have saved lives.

“NHS leaders have enormous responsibility for the health of their patients, yet currently face less regulation than bank managers. To protect patient safety, this must change. The case for a proper system of accountability has been made again and again.”

A 2019 review into tests to ensure senior NHS staff are competent set out a series of recommendations, but these were not taken up by ministers.

The Labour proposals would echo some of the ideas in this review, setting out that directors of English health trusts, as well as potentially those in less senior positions, would need to demonstrate the ability to respond to staff concerns and whistleblowing.

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