Tories plan to put GPs in driving seat
pharmafile | June 21, 2007 | News story | |Â Â Â
The Conservative party has unveiled its vision for the NHS, including the scrapping of targets, the creation of an independent board and greater powers for GPs.
Tory leader David Cameron has reiterated that the NHS is his party's number one priority in a bid to capitalise on growing voter discontent with Labour's handling of the health service.
In a deliberate break with Conservative policies of the past, Cameron said, if elected, the party would enshrine in law the free-at-the-point-of-care status of the NHS, and turn its back on past policies which encouraged greater use of private healthcare.
He also pledged "each year we will increase spending on the NHS", but would not provide further detail on the scale of any rise in budgets.
The Conservatives' White Paper, NHS Autonomy and Accountability, contains numerous major reforms, including a renegotiation of the GP contract, but Cameron nevertheless insists it would not represent another re-organisation of the system, calling it evolution not revolution.
Sharing the platform with Cameron at the NHS Confederation, shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley admitted that the NHS 'internal market' created by the last Conservative government was in reality too bureaucratic, but Cameron insisted the principles behind it remained sound.
"I am not saying that the internal market was perfect. But the principle behind it - the split between those who purchase services on behalf of patients and those who provide services in clinics and hospitals - is now almost universally accepted."
The party would also bring back a modified version of GP fundholding, as an evolution of the current Practice-Based Commissioning, because GPs need real, not hypothetical budgets, and would reward GPs for health outcomes rather than the clinical procedures carried out as in the current system.
An independent NHS board would also assume day-to-day control of the running of the service, with the Department of Health being re-born as the Department for Public Health.
Responding to the proposals, Gill Morgan, chief executive of NHS managers organisation the NHS Confederation said she welcomed the Tories commitment to a tax-funded system and its pledge not to undertake a violent change of direction or major reorganisation.
NHS managers also agreed with a shift towards measuring outcomes and towards greater autonomy for the service, she said, but most were not convinced an independent board would be the best way to achieve greater freedom.
Morgan also expressed doubt about the party's plans for GPs.
"The proposals around practice-based commissioning and renegotiating the GP contract are interesting, but may be difficult to put into practice," she concluded.
Doctors' association the BMA also welcomed plans for greater autonomy, but said it was "concerned at the continued emphasis on the 'social market' and enhancement of the purchaser-provider split" and said doctors would have to be convinced of changes to the current GP contract.
