By Richard Johnstone | 26 May 2011
The government’s controversial NHS plans suffered a further blow today after doctors’ leaders refused to back the plans. The British Medical Association says the proposals in the Health and Social Care Bill should be withdrawn due to the ‘very high levels of concern’ with the changes.
The Bill was put on hold on April 4 to allow the government to hear the views of the public and professionals. In its submission to the government’s ‘listening exercise’, the BMA says that the changes represent ‘an enormous risk’ when the NHS has to save £20bn by 2014/15.
Its concerns follow the NHS Confederation’s call yesterday for a rethink on the reforms, which would transfer health care commissioning from primary care trusts to consortiums of GPs. They would also open up NHS services to bids from ‘any willing provider’ to provide care.
The BMA says that NHS staff’s concerns are being exacerbated because changes are being implemented despite the ‘pause’.
More than 80% of the almost 1,000 members who contributed to the submission said their attitude to the reforms was either mostly or very unwelcoming. More than half said that the expanded role of NHS regulator Monitor to promote competition was the most damaging of the plans.
The submission calls for Monitor to be tasked with protecting and promoting integrated services through collaboration, not competition.
There should also be an explicit duty on the GP commissioning consortiums to fully involve all relevant clinical staff in a ‘more mature form of commissioning’.
Like the NHS Confederation, the BMA says there ‘should not be an artificially rigid timetable’ for the reforms. Specifically, the doctors say, the April 2014 deadline for all NHS trusts to achieve foundation status ‘could compromise patient safety’.
BMA chair Dr Hamish Meldrum said: ‘The message from doctors is clear and simple – the Bill must be changed significantly, if not withdrawn altogether, if the NHS is to continue to improve.
‘We are right in the thick of the challenges the NHS faces, and while change is necessary, this major upheaval is not. We know that the NHS has to become more efficient, that chronic illness is growing, and that we need a step change in improvements in public health. Increasing and enforcing competition is not the answer.’
The BMA has also today published guidance on three possible models for GP consortium governance. It says that there must be a ‘transparent process’ of financial accountability as large amounts of public money will be spent.
