Blow for NHS reforms as 60pc of family doctors oppose plans

The survey by the Royal College of GPs is another blow to the Government’s landmark plans which have faced a storm of criticism.

Prime Minister David Cameron yesterday admitted even his brother-in-law, a heart specialist in Hampshire married to the Tory leader’s sister Tania, had cast doubt on proposals to hand £80bn in public money to GPs.

NHS staff including nurses and midwives staged a demonstration outside Parliament as MPs yesterday started debating the plans, which union leaders warned will lead to hospital closures, tens of thousands of job losses, longer waiting lists and more expensive health services.

The survey of 1,800 GPs found overall 32 per cent disagreed with the direction of the reforms, 29 per cent strongly disagreed and another 15 per cent neither agreed or disagreed.

Ministers claim family doctors back the reforms but the poll found only one in five agreed with the direction of the plans and just four per cent strongly agreed.

College chairman Clare Gerada said: “These results show that a significant number of our members are keen to support GP-led commissioning; it is something the college, and GPs, have wanted for many years.

“However, our members are telling us that they are worried about the pace at which these reforms are being implemented, the danger of fragmentation of services, and the emphasis on competition, and they are not sure whether the proposals really will have the positive impact on patient care that is intended.

“Our members are also worried that time which could be spent caring for patients will be taken away to deal with budgeting and administration and that this will impact negatively on the quality and continuity of care our patients receive.”

At a health centre in London, Mr Cameron said: “My brother-in-law is a hospital doctor and he says ‘you’re giving too much power to the GPs, and hospitals will be disadvantaged’.”

The Prime Minister insisted the “biggest risk” to the NHS would be to do nothing.

“If you look at the growth of the elderly population, look at the new drugs that are coming on stream, the new treatments, if we keep the system we have now and don’t make changes to cut bureaucracy and waste, I think it will become increasingly unaffordable,” he said.

The GMB union said the NHS enjoyed record satisfaction ratings with the public. Hospital waiting times averaged less than nine weeks last May, with Yorkshire showing average waits of only seven weeks, the lowest in the country.

National officer for health, Rehana Azam, said: “NHS staff have worked hard to create a service that we can all be proud of. Health Secretary Andrew Lansley’s untested experiment throwing the NHS into cost-cutting competition with private consortiums is going to strangle the life out of it.”

Unite assistant general secretary Gail Cartmail said the plans would “destroy the NHS”.

“It will allow NHS staff, skills, buildings and resources to be snatched by profit-hungry companies. It will open up huge ravines of inequality in our communities as GP businesses close their doors to those with costly care needs,” she said.

Shadow Health Secretary John Healey said: “If private companies bid to undercut local hospital services, GPs will have to take the work away from the hospital. This is not what people expected when David Cameron promised to protect the NHS.”