Secretary of State for Health and Social Care Sajid Javid has been accused of being “out of touch” and “stirring hate” against GPs. The slamming came after a £250 million support package was offered to family doctors to ensure all patients can see a doctor face to face. GPs have been facing increasing pressure to resume normal consultations after a majority of appointments had to be moved either online or on the phone because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Speaking on BBC Breakfast, Charlie Stayt said: “The package as a whole is very little. It shows the Government completely out of touch with the scale of the crisis on the ground.
“And this seems to be the key issue. You’re talking about installing CCTV if people are angry.
“You’re being accused this morning by a GP of stirring up the rhetoric, the anti-GP rhetoric.
‘They are accusing you of that.”
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Sajid Javid said in response: “Well, this is a support package.
“I mean, I think most people find it hard to see how a quarter of billion pounds of extra funding, how changes in red tape they’ve asked for, about how getting pharmacists to help take some of the workload, how that is actually not going to help GPs, in terms of what they actually love doing best which is seeing their patients.
“This is all about support.
“Let’s remember during this pandemic, we’ve had people rightly and understandably stay away from the NHS including doctors because they were asked to during the height of the pandemic.”
He went on: “There are many people out there on waiting lists that need help.
“They need support, and it’s important that they now come forward, and they get that support and it makes sense to ask people to do that.
“But at the same time to provide the support that GPs have asked for.
“That’s what this is about, to work in partnership with GPs to see what more we can do.”
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Ministers unveiled a £250m winter rescue package for GPs in England to see more patients face-to-face.
Social distancing rules are expected to be relaxed so that GPs can bring more people into their buildings.
The emergency funding comes amid rising criticism about the fall in face-to-face appointments since the start of the pandemic.
Only 58% of patients were seen face-to-face in August, comparing with more than 80% before the pandemic.