BMA Collective Action: Practices Open As Usual

GP partners have voted in favour of taking part in collective action. This difficult decision has been taken because funding for GP services no longer matches the increased demands on the system. This has led to practices becoming overstretched and unable to offer the care that our patients deserve.  

This action is necessary because the system is broken with fewer doctors seeing more patients, without the resources they need. General Practice currently provides over 1.5m appointments per month and 65% of those are face to face - a significant increase from pre-pandemic levels. Overall practices receive around 7% of the NHS budget whilst providing over 90% of the patient contacts.  

Please note that practices will remain open during the period of collective action and will continue to provide appointments to patients. However, GPs will stop doing some of the unfunded additional back office work that they have had to take on to keep the wider health service running.  

Whilst the disruption to patient facing services will be kept to a minimum you may find that you are given an appointment by other healthcare professionals like nurses, physios, and pharmacists or be directed to other services if that is the most appropriate way to deal with your problem. This is to ensure that we deliver safe and effective care for those that need it and we use other services where it is safe and appropriate to do so.  

We apologise for any inconvenience. Thank you for your support whilst we introduce the new system which we are confident will make it easier for you to access appointments in future.