NHS: Walk-in Centres

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Tuesday 10th December 2013 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, when any service change is proposed, we expect that the four tests which the Government laid down early on in their term of office should be followed. One of those is a patient and public consultation or involvement in the decision. Another is clinical buy-in. I can give the noble Baroness the assurance that this is what local area teams of NHS England would expect to see in any proposals involving the closure of a walk-in centre.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, does my noble friend share my concern that the NHS is paying twice for patients who regularly use walk-in centres due to the capitation payment to GPs and activity payment to other care systems? Could part of the alternative provision to closed walk-in centres be that all GP practices follow the good practice of those who already extend opening hours for early and late sessions and Saturdays?

[Earl Howe]

The noble Baroness makes an extremely good point. One of the findings of the Monitor review was that, when responsibility for walk-in centres was handed down to local commissioners in 2007, many of them were decommissioned because they were duplicating services locally and GPs felt that they were paying twice for the same thing. I am sure that the ideas the noble Baroness has put forward will have a resonance in many areas.