Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, whether it is his policy to allow GP practices to exclude patients from their register on the basis of pregnancy, age, substance dependence or complexity?

Under the terms of their contracts, general practitioner (GP) practices must have reasonable grounds to remove a patient from their practice list which do not relate to the patient’s race, gender, social class, age, religion, sexual orientation, appearance, disability or medical condition.

If a patient feels that the decision to remove them from their list relates to any of these conditions, they may raise a complaint with NHS England. It is the role of NHS England to ensure GP practices meet the terms of their contract.