Speaking to the Guardian, DAUK called for greater transparency and safeguards after TPG bought Optum UK, the firm behind the electronic patient record system used by most GP practices in England.

DAUK said: “Private equity now owns the plumbing of English general practice. The GP records of more than half the country sit on a system controlled by a firm whose business model is returns for investors, not care for patients, and the public found out after the fact.

“We want the government to set out what safeguards exist, what happens to the data if TPG later sells the asset, and why none of this was put to parliament.”

Read the Guardian article in full.

DAUK committee members are all volunteers and campaign on issues facing frontline doctors in their own time. Please support our work by joining DAUK or donating to our GoFundMe.

DAUK welcomed the appointment of Cooper as an opportunity to restore trust, strengthen public services and place patient safety at the heart of NHS reform.

Dr Matt Kneale, DAUK co-chair, said: “The NHS does not lack the commitment of its staff. It lacks a coherent settlement that enables enough doctors to train and stay, protects patients when they are most vulnerable and gives clinicians confidence that policy is driven by evidence rather than short term expediency.”

Dr Steve Taylor, DAUK GP co-lead, added: “We welcome Yvette Cooper into her role as the new Health and Social Care Secretary, and look forward to the opportunity to work with her.

“She takes on the role with so much to do and many in the NHS workforce disillusioned.

Collaboration and listening

“We look forward to a new day of collaboration and listening to the people who work in the NHS and patient voices. Top down reorganisation and implementation is not the answer.”

With GPs and consultants in dispute with Government, waiting lists still at record levels and pressures across the system, it’s important that she understands the challenges ahead.

“The previous spin of success hid a lot of issues but there are solutions to be found in collaboration.”

DAUK has asked Cooper and new Prime Minister Andy Burnham to make five commitments to healthcare.

Five commitments

• End the medical training bottleneck. Publish specialty by specialty training numbers, fund a credible expansion to meet medical school output and NHS need, and guarantee fair progression for doctors already serving the NHS, including SAS doctors and locally employed doctors.
• Guarantee doctor-led assessment where it matters most. Set national standards so that patients urgently referred by a GP, and patients with undifferentiated symptoms in hospital, are assessed by a doctor or have discharge approved by one. Non-doctor roles should complement doctors, never replace medical assessment.
• Rebuild the family doctor model. Properly fund general practice to provide timely access, continuity and safe clinical decision making. Pause unfunded or unsafe access requirements until they have been independently safety tested and properly resourced.
• Restore fair and independent medical regulation. Remove the GMC’s separate power to appeal decisions of its own tribunal, protect the independence of the MPTS and ensure independent oversight sits with the Professional Standards Authority. A regulator cannot credibly be investigator, prosecutor and appellant.
• Treat the climate and nature crisis as an urgent health crisis, ensuring health infrastructure is adapted to be safe in extreme heat by introducing enforceable maximum safe temperatures for healthcare facilities, delivering a public awareness campaign on the relationship between climate change and health, and supporting an accelerated program of decarbonisation and nature restoration for health.

Dr Kneale said: “These are practical, deliverable reforms that would improve patient safety, retain skilled clinicians and demonstrate that the Government is listening to those delivering care every day.

“We would welcome an early meeting with you and your team to discuss how frontline clinicians can help shape and deliver this programme.”

We are a non-profit campaigning and lobbying organisation led by frontline doctors, for frontline doctors. We are volunteers and our collective aim is to give frontline workers a voice to be heard.

Please support our work by contributing to our crowd funder.

This decision follows concerns from DAUK, the British Medical Association (BMA) and others that the original consultation presented the recommendations of the Lord Mann Review in a misleading and legally flawed way.

DAUK acted before the original consultation deadline.

On 9 June, solicitors acting for DAUK, Leigh Day, wrote to the Secretary of State for Health and the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) seeking a one-month extension to the consultation.

Lord Mann Review

The request highlighted that Lord Mann’s Review had been published on 4 June, leaving doctors and representative organisations less than three weeks to consider its recommendations before the consultation was due to close on 23 June.

DHSC initially refused DAUK’s request for a formal extension, although it agreed that DAUK could submit further material concerning the Mann Review by 30 June.

The Government later revised its position, extending the consultation by four weeks to 21 July.

However, DAUK made clear that an extension alone could not correct the underlying problem with the consultation.

Withdrawn and reissued

On 29 June, Leigh Day wrote again on our behalf, arguing that the consultation remained misleading and calling for the sections dealing with the GMC’s appeal powers to be withdrawn and reissued.

DAUK has worked closely with other representatives of the medical profession during this process and supported the legal challenge brought by the BMA.

DAUK’s draft consultation response and legal position were informed by detailed work from our members, and we will refine this further for the new consultation.

The Government has now confirmed that it will consult again on the proposals, a decision DAUK believes is welcome and necessary. It also demonstrates the impact that coordinated legal, professional and public pressure can have.

DAUK continues to oppose the GMC retaining a separate right to appeal MPTS decisions.

Independent oversight

The Professional Standards Authority already provides independent oversight and has its own power to challenge decisions.

Giving the GMC an overlapping appeal power risks undermining the independence of the tribunal system and perpetuating the mistrust identified following the case of Dr Hadiza Bawa-Garba.

Dr Matt Kneale, DAUK co-chair, said: “The government initially rejected DAUK’s request for a proper extension, before extending the consultation for everyone and now accepting that it must consult again

“That sequence shows why it was essential for doctors’ organisations to challenge this process.

“DAUK was clear that additional time alone would not cure a consultation that presented the arguments unfairly.

Collaborative work

“Through our legal team, our consultation response, and our work alongside the BMA, we helped maintain the pressure for the affected proposals to be withdrawn and reconsidered.

“This is an important result for doctors, patients and fair regulation.

“We will continue to argue that independent oversight should rest with the Professional Standards Authority, rather than allowing the GMC to act as investigator, prosecutor and appellant.”

We are a non-profit campaigning and lobbying organisation led by frontline doctors, for frontline doctors. We are volunteers and our collective aim is to give frontline workers a voice to be heard.

Please support our work by contributing to our crowd funder.

Skills for Health, a not-for-profit organisation committed to the development of an improved and sustainable UK healthcare workforce, is running a survey on how AI is being adopted across healthcare.

It aims to understand what is working well, where there are challenges, and what support staff need.

The survey is voluntary and should take no longer than 10 minutes to complete. Responses are treated in confidence.

Take part in the survey.

We are a non-profit campaigning and lobbying organisation led by frontline doctors, for frontline doctors. We are volunteers and our collective aim is to give frontline workers a voice to be heard.

Please support our work by contributing to our crowd funder.

Share this article

The survey aims  to collect insights into the availability and desire of clinicians (full time, part time, peri-retired and retired) to commit time to delivering NHS Online care alongside their substantive NHS employment/current role. 

This survey should take you around five to 10 minutes to complete and all information will be collected anonymously. 

It follows a similar survey for consultants and specialty, associate specialist and specialist (SAS) doctors, published in October 2025

The findings will help inform NHS Online’s employment offer for the clinical workforce. 

Complete the survey here: https://www.engage.england.nhs.uk/data-and-digital/nhs-online-clinician-survey/

It closes on 31 July.

We are a non-profit campaigning and lobbying organisation led by frontline doctors, for frontline doctors. We are volunteers and our collective aim is to give frontline workers a voice to be heard.

Please support our work by contributing to our crowd funder.

DAUK took legal advice on the Department of Health and Social Care’s consultation on the draft General Medical Council Order 2026.

The association is now weighing its position alongside the British Medical Association (BMA), which has begun legal proceedings against the government over the same issue.

The draft Order proposes preserving and widening the GMC’s right of appeal against MPTS decisions, which is a significant reversal of the policy consensus reached after the Bawa-Garba case.

Williams Review

Following the independent Williams Review in 2018, the government accepted that the GMC’s right of appeal against MPTS decisions should be removed, in order to strengthen the independence of medical adjudication and rebuild doctors’ trust in the regulator. The draft Order abandons that commitment.

DAUK also shares the BMA’s concern that the consultation misrepresents the findings of Lord Mann’s review and fails to give consultees enough information to respond meaningfully – raising questions about whether the consultation process is lawful.

DAUK co-chair Dr Matt Kneale said: “Eight years ago, after the Williams Review, the government accepted that the GMC should lose its power to appeal tribunal decisions – the very power used against Dr Bawa-Garba, which did such lasting damage to doctors’ trust in the GMC.

Broken promise

“For ministers now to quietly retain and even extend that power, through a consultation that doctors say misrepresents the evidence and gives them too little to respond to, breaks that promise.

“We have taken legal advice and, alongside the BMA, we are actively considering our next steps.”

Meanwhile, DAUK has joined 12 other medical organisations urging the government to reconsider its plan to retain the GMC’s right to appeal the decisions of its own tribunal service.

Coalition of medical organisations

In a joint letter to Minister of State for Health, Karin Smyth MP, the coalition argues the GMC’s right of appeal risks seriously undermining the profession’s and the public’s trust in the independence of the tribunal process, and the regulator itself.

Read more about the coalition’s calls.

We are a non-profit campaigning and lobbying organisation led by frontline doctors, for frontline doctors. We are volunteers and our collective aim is to give frontline workers a voice to be heard.

Please support our work by contributing to our crowd funder.

The cross-party Science, Innovation and Technology Committee warns that the UK’s increasing reliance on Palantir has created an ‘unacceptable point of weakness’.

It highlights concerns around value for money, transparency, public trust, and the long-term strategic risks of entrusting critical public infrastructure to a single overseas technology provider.

NHS Federated Data Platform

The report, titled Rewiring the state: delivering digital government, recommends that the Government ‘should commit to exercising the 2027 break clause in the NHS Federated Data Platform (FDP) contract’.

It goes on to recommend the Government ‘either develops an in-house replacement or seek an alternative developed by UK-owned and UK-based providers that are more compatible with UK values, and do not pursue either technical or contractual dependencies’.

The report called for a fully-costed exit plan for the FDP by the end of this year.

Poor value for money

Dr David Nicholl, DAUK committee member, said: “This is an excellent report and highlights the warnings that DAUK has been making for more than five years, that Palantir’s FDP provides poor value for money from a company with ethical values that are a million miles away from those of the NHS.

“The Government should publish an exit plan, and look at alternative providers that can deliver better outcomes for patients at less cost, safely, securely and ethically.”

DAUK has consistently raised concerns about the award of the £330 million FDP contract to Palantir. These include the risk of NHS dependency on a single supplier, uncertainty about long-term value for money, questions around transparency in procurement, and the impact of Palantir’s wider activities on public trust in NHS data systems.

Ignored warnings

Dr Steve Taylor, DAUK GP co-lead, added: “There is a growing consensus that Palantir should not be anywhere near public services, and in particular patient data in the NHS.

“DAUK and other groups have been saying this for years, yet governments have continued to ignore the warnings.

“Ministers are public servants first, they need to heed the warnings and use the break clause in 2027. Influence is being bought against the best interests of the public.”

Read the Rewiring the state: delivering digital government report in full.

We are a non-profit campaigning and lobbying organisation led by frontline doctors, for frontline doctors. We are volunteers and our collective aim is to give frontline workers a voice to be heard.

Please support our work by contributing to our crowd funder.

Organised by Medact, the fringe event is titled Beyond Palantir – what’s next for the Federated Data Platform?

It takes place from 5pm to 6pm on 10 June at HOME Manchester, a fully accessible venue located a short walk from Manchester Central Convention Complex.

NHS Federated Data Platform

The event comes amid growing parliamentary discussion about the potential for the break clause in the NHS Federated Data Platform contract with Palantir to be triggered in 2027.

DAUK has consistently opposed the involvement of Palantir in the NHS data and has raised concerns regarding transparency, governance, and public confidence.

A panel of data and health equity experts have been invited to speak at the event and there will be the possibility for questions and discussion. 

Speakers include:

• Matt Hennessey, chief data and analytics officer, Greater Manchester ICB
• Marc Farr, chair, NHS Chief Data and Analytical Officer Network, Advisory Board member, APHA National Data Advisory Group
• Emma Runswick, deputy chair of Council, British Medical Association 

Sign up on the Medact website.

DAUK is run by frontline doctors for frontline doctors. Please support our work by donating to our GoFundMe.

The episode has been recorded to mark Mental Health Awareness Week.

Hosted by Dr Steve Taylor, GP co-lead at the Doctors Association UK (DAUK), it features Samantha Watham, chief operating officer of Frontline 19, and psychotherapist Claire Goodwin-Fee, who discuss the urgent realities facing frontline staff.

The episode highlights the startling data behind rising stress, burnout, and suicide risk, especially among nurses and women, and why the stigma around seeking support persists.

Frontline 19, a non-profit organisation delivering psychological support and counselling to the NHS and UK frontline workers, reveals that on average, one nurse takes their life every week, and a doctor every three weeks.

The episode explores the startling data behind rising stress, burnout, and suicide risk, especially among nurses and women, and why the stigma around seeking support persists.

It breaks down tangible solutions that are surprisingly simple and cost-effective. From debrief spaces to changing workplace culture, the guests share strategies that can save lives and rebuild resilience.

Dr Taylor said: “This episode is an urgent call to action for healthcare workers, policymakers, and anyone who cares about a healthier, more compassionate system.

Mental health support

“If you believe mental health support should be a right, not a privilege, this conversation is essential listening.”

Watch the full episode here: Not the NHS Again – Mental Health Awareness Week special

The Not the NHS Again podcast is a collaboration between Keep Our NHS Public and DAUK.

Watch all previous episodes here: Not the NHS Again podcast.

We are a non-profit campaigning and lobbying organisation led by frontline doctors, for frontline doctors. We are volunteers and our collective aim is to give frontline workers a voice to be heard.

Please support our work by contributing to our crowd funder.

DAUK notes that in his statement, Streeting cited the government’s unpopularity. However, many NHS staff will feel he had become an increasingly unpopular health secretary.

There has been a growing sense that the concerns of frontline NHS workers, and in particularly doctors, were not being listened to or addressed.

DAUK hopes that whoever succeeds him will take a more collaborative approach and will genuinely listen to NHS staff.

Ten Year Health Plan concerns

DAUK has raised concerns about several aspects of the Government’s Ten Year Health Plan, including the increasing role of the private sector in NHS delivery, unresolved issues around pay and working conditions, training.

There are also concerns linked to the Single Patient Record, the involvement of Palantir Technologies in NHS data systems, and the lobbying of Government by corporations and private individuals .

The challenges facing the NHS are significant, and meaningful reform will only succeed through partnership with the workforce delivering care every day.

Meaningful engagement

Dr Matt Kneale, DAUK co-chair, said: “Doctors do not need another period of headline-driven reform, rushed announcements, or policy made without meaningful engagement with the workforce.

“The next health secretary should begin by rebuilding trust, meeting frontline staff, listening without defensiveness and recognising that patient safety and workforce morale are inseparable.

“That means tackling unsafe scope creep, ending the use of ACPs as substitutes for doctors on medical rotas, being honest with patients about who is providing their care, and engaging seriously with the profession to avoid further industrial action.

“It also means addressing doctors’ concerns about the impact of the new draft GMC order, which appears to reverse years of agreed progress on how health regulators should interact with their registrants.”

Stability and leadership

Dr Sarah Jacques, DAUK GP co-lead, said: “During a time when we desperately need stability and leadership, I am concerned about the chaos that we are seeing again.

“However, I am not sad to see the resignation of a health secretary who has shut down the voice of general practice and made conditions for GPs and patients so much worse.

“I look forward to a new health secretary who is prepared to work with GPs and appreciate the genuine worth that we bring to the NHS.”

We are a non-profit campaigning and lobbying organisation led by frontline doctors, for frontline doctors. We are volunteers and our collective aim is to give frontline workers a voice to be heard.

Please support our work by contributing to our crowd funder.