Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to reduce waiting times for GP appointments.

The Government has committed to ensuring that everyone can see their general practitioner (GP) at a convenient time by increasing the availability of routine appointments in general practice in the evening and at the weekend.

By March 2019, all clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) should provide extended access to general practice for the whole of their registered population (subject to local demand). This includes ensuring that access is available during peak times of demand, including bank holidays and across the Easter, Christmas and New Year periods. ‘Refreshing NHS plans’, published by NHS England in February 2018, included the deliverable for CCGs to provide extended access to GP services for 100% of their population by October 2018. This was to ensure additional capacity was in place ahead of winter 2018.

NHS England and Health Education England (HEE) are working together with the profession to increase the GP workforce. This includes measures to boost recruitment, address the reasons why GPs are leaving the profession, and encourage GPs to return to practice.

The number of doctors entering GP speciality training has been increasing year on year. This year, HEE recruited the highest number of GP trainees ever - 3,473 GP trainees against a target of 3,250, a 10% increase on last year.

Greater skill mix is also key to releasing capacity in general practice. We have committed to investment in the multidisciplinary workforce in general practice. As of September 2018, there were over 3,700 additional clinical staff, excluding GPs, working in general practice compared to 2015; consisting of over 600 more nurses and 3,000 more other direct patient care staff.