Integrated Care Boards Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateBaroness Meacher
Main Page: Baroness Meacher (Crossbench - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Baroness Meacher's debates with the Department of Health and Social Care
(1 year, 11 months ago)
Lords ChamberI understand from a senior ICB medical member that doctors expect general practice to be in the position that dentistry is in today in a bit of time. In other words, access to a GP will depend on the ability to pay. That is incredibly serious—it is the end of the NHS as we have known it, free at the point of delivery and need. Will the Minister take back to his colleagues the absolutely essential point that the Government must ask the ICBs to prioritise the assessment of general practice in their areas and to develop a strategy to ensure that general practice continues to be free at the point of need?
The noble Baroness makes the point about general practice. One thing that we are looking at, which will probably come up in the debate later in the week on the future of primary care, is the whole issue of what GPs do. There are many things they do that they do not have to do—these could be done by local partners, practice nurses, physiotherapists or social prescribing, and so on. In addition, Ministers and the NHS have been in conversation with GPs’ representatives, looking at these particular issues.