LMC Update – 09 September 2024
Launch of BMA GP Safe Working Guidance Handbook
Following the overwhelming YES vote in our ballot over the summer, practices are starting to take action as part of our ‘Protect your Patients and Protect your Practice‘ campaign.
GPC England have published a ‘Safe working guidance’ handbook to help GPs and practices in the delivery of safe, high-quality care for their patients and communities. The profession wants to provide care without risking harm to others or ourselves.
At a time of unprecedented pressures, we must make changes to our workload to preserve patient care in the face of a shrinking workforce and rising demand. This will help to protect the sustainability and future of general practice.
It is recommended that you do this by focusing on the delivery of General Medical Services, in line with the needs of your patients and practice, and deprioritising work and activities that fall outside of your core contractual requirements. This guidance reflects the contractual changes imposed by NHS England in April 2024. BMA offers ways of doing this that still enable you to stay within the terms of your GMS/PMS.
The guidance outlines how to manage workload effectively, setting safe limits of 25 patient consultations per day in line with UEMO recommendations, and encouraging practices to adopt systems that protect both patients and staff.
The BMA handbook can be downloaded and saved from the website: www.bma.org.uk/GPsSafeWorking.
Further guidance and resources such webinars and FAQs can also be accessed, with patient information posters and social media graphics to download and share.
We cannot care for our patients if we do not care for ourselves and our colleagues.
Practice Finance Survey – DEADLINE MIDDAY 17 SEPTEMBER
BMA is inviting practices in England to complete a Practice Finance survey, to build evidence to support the annual contract negotiations. This is your opportunity to feed into an evidence base demonstrating the impact of inflation and rising cost over the last couple of years, on GP practices.
Please share the survey link with your practice manager colleagues so that they can complete the survey. The survey will close at 9am, Tuesday 17 September.
It is recommended that respondents have relevant information to hand before starting the survey: they will need GP practice accounts for 2022/23 and 2023/24, expenditure data for April 2023 and April 2024, and information on staff numbers and practice list size. Take the survey
Action tracker survey
BMA is gathering data on any actions that practices across England are taking, and from 16 September, surveys will be sent monthly. BMA will share the survey with LMCs to distribute to practices and will be contacting partner members directly to ask you to input data per practice.
BMA wants to hear about the actions you are doing, or considering so please do reply when you receive the survey during the week commencing 16 September. Responses from practices helps to monitor how collective action is progressing across the country, supporting our negotiations and work towards a GP contract that is fit for purpose. The data will not be shared outside of the BMA.
GPCE view on request for Cloud Based Telephony data
As part of the 2024/25 contract imposed on the profession in April, NHS England (NHSE) have sought directions from the Secretary of State to extract data from our clinical systems on our Cloud Based Telephony (CBT) usage. An email has been sent by NHSE outlining the instructions to comply with this data extraction under section 259 (1) (a) of the Health and Social Care Act 2012, stating:
‘All general practices are therefore mandated to comply with this invitation and approve the collection.’
The legal basis for the collection is explained in the Data Provision Notice, which will enable your call data to be extracted on a monthly basis.
The BMA has taken its own legal advice:
Practices cannot decline the instructions, as doing so will risk breaching their contract.
BMA has made it clear to NHSE that the data must not be used to performance manage practices or single them out for criticism.
The PCN DES includes three components of the Capacity and Access Improvement Payment (CAIP). This data extraction is the component pertaining to the existing use of CBT and the relevant metrics. GPCE advice is that should a practice fail to sign up ahead of the October 1st deadline, there may be a risk of a breach notice being imposed as well as contravening the Health and Social Care Act 2012.
There is another component which relates to ask No 9 in our collective action campaign. BMA has significant concerns around online consultation software being available to patients from 08:00-18:30 given practices’ lack of capacity, and their responsibilities for ensuing patient safety.
GPCE advice continues to apply here: CDs and PCNs are advised not to sign this particular declaration presently, but to await further guidance closer to the financial year end.
Read the full update here and if you have any queries, please email us at info.gpc@bma.org.uk
Rollout of the medical examiner system in England
In England, the statutory implementation of the medical examiner system will take place on 9 September 2024. This will mean that independent scrutiny by a medical examiner will become a statutory requirement prior to the registration of all non-coronial deaths from this date. Information from the Department of Health and Social Care is here.
While many are using the medical examiner system, some are not. If you require further information on implementation in your area, please contact your LMC. For more wider information on the medical examiner system please contact the BMA.
Zero tolerance of racism: download our poster
Last month’s racist, Islamophobic and anti-migrant riots were hugely distressing with wide reaching impact felt across healthcare settings and communities. All healthcare workers have a right to work in an environment free from abuse. Patients need to be warned that there will be zero tolerance of racist behaviour with resultant consequences, should this not be respected. BMA has produced a poster you can print and display in your premises, making it clear that racist abuse will not be tolerated.
You can also contact the BMA for wellbeing and support, and we have guidance for managing discrimination from patients, with clear steps to take when incidents of racist abuse against healthcare staff occur.
Successful RCGP legal challenge in support of disabled doctors
The BMA has won a legal challenge supporting a trainee GP who believed they had been unfairly treated by the RCGP because of its policy on the number of attempts at taking an exam. The BMA supported the doctor to bring judicial review proceedings challenging the lawfulness of the RCGP’s attempts policy, which only allows four attempts at the AKT/RCA exam required to complete GP training. According to the policy, no additional attempts would be granted, even in circumstances where a candidate discovered, after sitting a test, that they had a disability which would have entitled them to “reasonable adjustments”, including additional time for the taking of the test.
GP pension campaign in England
At the end of July, the BMA’s pensions committee launched a campaign to assist GPs in England to get their pension records up to date. There is a step-by-step guide for members to follow, with pre-populated email templates to assist. It is important to ensure that your record is as accurate as possible so you can make appropriate decisions about your pension and the McCloud remedy.
If you have received your 05 and AA statement from NHS Pensions, and your record is not updated to 2022-23, you can check what years are missing from your record by logging into your PCSE Pensions Online account. As the Pensions Online system is updated in sequential order, you will be able to see which type 1 or type 2 form is holding up your record from being up to date. You can then submit the required forms via your online account or through the online form.
If you have submitted all required forms and your record is still not up to date, you should raise a complaint with PCSE. If it not fully resolved within 40 days – follow the escalation process.