Brown slams GPs over polyclinics

Polyclinics bring a range of specialist care under one roof

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has attacked doctors' leaders for their "ill-founded" opposition to planned changes to GP care in England.

The British Medical Association is against what it says is the imposition of polyclinics and super-surgeries.

It has delivered a petition to 10 Downing Street signed by over a million people supporting current services.

But at his monthly press conference, Mr Brown said the issue was improving access, not axing existing surgeries.

We are very concerned by the inaccurate and misleading statements made as part of your current campaign Ben Bradshaw, health minister Who's right about polyclinics?

He said claims by the BMA that the plans would lead to provision being privatised were also wrong.

"The issue at the moment is about increasing access to primary care, not replacing the existing GPs.

"We want GPs to be open longer hours and we want them open at weekends.

"And if that is not possible in some cases, we want to provide other sources of medical care."

Reviews

The idea of polyclinics - which would house diagnostic as well as GP services under one roof - is a controversial one.

The establishment of the clinics was proposed by the surgeon Lord Darzi in a review of London's health services last year.

Since he became health minister, he has recommended a separate network of 150 GP-led health centres be set up across England.

Ministers deny that polyclinics and the GP-led centres are the same thing.

But opponents class them together, saying there is little distinction.

The BMA is also accusing the government of trying to commercialise the GP system.

Its petition, which has been placed in thousands of practices across the county and on the web for the past three weeks and has so far attracted 1.2m signatures.

It calls on the government to support existing GP practices and halt the promotion of the involvement of private firms in the profession.

Managers have been told to invite bids from both GPs and private firms to run the new network of super surgeries.

But the approach by the doctors' trade union has triggered a furious response from the government.

'Disappointment'

Dr Laurence Buckman, head of the BMA's GPs committee, told delegates at a conference in London on Thursday: "My message to Gordon Brown is this: Whatever you think of GPs, take note of what your electorate thinks.

"We're not saying we're perfect. We want to improve.

"But work with us to do that, not against us, and ignore at your peril the wishes of the most important people in the NHS - the patients."

But the approach by the doctors' trade union has triggered a furious response from the government.

Health minister Ben Bradshaw has written to Hamish Meldrum, the head of the BMA, saying: "We are very concerned by the inaccurate and misleading statements made as part of your current campaign against the government's primary care policy."

Mr Bradshaw said the government had announced £250m investment last autumn to fund the new GP-led centres, plus extra GP surgeries in under-doctored areas.

He added: "We are disappointed that the BMA is opposing this additional investment and painting such a distorted picture of what it will mean on the ground."

Mr Bradshaw added he was not surprised the BMA's petition had attracted so many signatures given the "misleading and mendacious" nature of its campaign.

But shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley said patients were right to be worried.