Proposals to sack NHS managers if they fail to perform in league tables have been criticised by DAUK\u2019s GP committee.\r\n\r\nThe committee said it was ‘somewhat surprised’ a package of reforms announced by Health Secretary Wes Streeting – including the introduction of NHS league tables – failed to mention the role of general practice.\r\n\r\nUnder the reforms, a review will be carried out of NHS performance across the country, with providers placed into a league table.\r\n\r\nPersistently failing managers will be replaced and turn around teams deployed to help providers which are running big deficits or poor services for patients. They will be offered urgent, effective support to improve their service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dr Ellen Welch, DAUK vice chair, said Mr Streeting\u2019s speech to the NHS Providers conference made no mention of GPs. This was \u2018despite Lord Darzi\u2019s report<\/a> advising him to invest in general practice\u2019.\r\n\r\nShe said: \u201cIn England, the number of medical staff working in hospitals has increased by thousands while general practices have closed in their hundreds, and the primary care workforce is shrinking with almost 2,000 fewer GPs than we had in 2015.\r\n\r\n\u201cDespite this, an average of 1.4 million GP appointments per working day were delivered between March 2023 and February 2024.\r\n\r\n\u201cMr Streeting is looking for better value for money. General practice is already providing remarkable value for money and with proper funding can provide even more.\u201d\r\n\r\nDr Lizzie Toberty, DAUK\u2019s GP lead, warned the proposals may demoralise staff.\r\n\r\nShe said: \u201cI broadly support more accountability for managers.\r\n\r\n“Helping struggling trusts rather than demonising them is vital to reducing the toxic culture which exists in so many.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHowever, when did league tables in health or education ever improve care? They solve nothing. In the worst cases they will demoralise staff and encourage manipulation of the figures.\r\n\r\n\u201cThe announcement is massively avoiding the elephant in the room, namely National Insurance contributions which are about to collapse general practice.\u201d\r\n\r\nDr Welch echoed Dr Toberty\u2019s concern league tables would hit morale.\r\n\r\nShe said: \u201cIntroducing league tables sounds like a sure fire way to demoralise hard working staff even further.\r\n\r\n\u201cNo one goes to work in the NHS to do a bad job. I worry these plans are going to create more problems for trusts that are already struggling.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dr Sarah Jacques, DAUK GP committee member, said many factors might contribute to underperformance.\r\n\r\nShe said: \u201cA rewards system feels like a postcode lottery with the ones doing well getting more funding and the ones doing badly getting funding cut – and then getting worse.\r\n\r\n\u201cTertiary centres may end up with worse outcomes due to more complex cases with higher risk.\r\n\r\n\u201cThere are too many factors that can’t be directly compared. Different demographics, poverty levels, functioning versus non-functioning local authorities.\r\n\r\n\u201cLeague tables oversimplify it all.\u201d\r\n\r\nDr Rosie Shire, DAUK GP committee member, added: \u201cWe already have Care Quality Commission (CQC) ranking hospitals in a similar way to Ofsted. I don’t think that has helped improve things.\r\n\r\n\u201cHow will league tables show anything different to CQC ranking? And how will it all impact upon the mental health of staff?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dr Steve Taylor, DAUK GP committee member, said he was \u2018somewhat surprised\u2019 Mr Streeting failed to mention GPs in his speech today.\r\n\r\nHe said: \u201cBy the end of today 1.4million people will have consulted in general practice and half the population by the end of the month.\r\n\r\n\u201cA continued focus on secondary care fails to address the problem, that with just 5.6 per cent of the NHS budget going to GP practices, they cannot provide the services needed to prevent illness, support patients in their homes and provide care closer to home.\r\n\r\n\u201cProper general practice investment will fix the NHS and improve care for patients.\u201d\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nSupport the work of DAUK by becoming a member<\/a> or donating to our Go Fund Me<\/a>.\r\n\r\nRead Mr Streeting’s speech in full<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Proposals to sack NHS managers if they fail to perform in league tables have been criticised by DAUK\u2019s GP committee. The committee said it was…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1492,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65,59,58],"tags":[324,426,656,22,61,23,333,683],"class_list":["post-1313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dauk-news","category-general-practice","category-the-nhs","tag-dr-ellen-welch","tag-dr-rosie-shire","tag-dr-sarah-jacques","tag-dr-steve-taylor","tag-general-practice","tag-gp-crisis","tag-health-secretary","tag-wes-streeting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1313"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1313\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}NHS league tables<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Postcode lottery<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
GP investment<\/h3>\n\n\n\n