Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 16 May 2019 to Question 253711 on General Practitioners: Finance, from which sources GPs’ surgeries can obtain funding for recruitment costs in the period before clinical directors take up their posts.

Each Primary Care Network (PCN) is required to appoint a Clinical Director who will take up their post formally from July 2019. Under the terms of the Network Contract Directed Enhanced Service (DES), PCNs can claim a funding contribution for this role. In 2019/20 this is a payment of £0.51430 per registered patient for the period 1 July 2019 to 31 March 2020.

Practices will receive funding for participating in a PCN through the Network Participation Payment of £0.147 per weighted patient for the period from 1 April 2019. This becomes payable once they have signed up to the Network Contract DES and the DES commences, from 1 July 2019. In addition, once established, PCNs are entitled to funding of £0.125 per patient per month from clinical commissioning group (CCG) allocations, the first payment of which will cover the period 1 April to 31 July.

Collectively, these funding streams and others mean PCNs receive £296 million in 2019/20. The Network Participation Payment and the clinical commissioning group PCN funding together reflect the additional work undertaken, including between 1 April and 30 June, to establish PCNs and appoint Clinical Directors.