22.09.16
CCGs must draft local Forward View implementation plans by December
NHS England’s new two-year planning guidance, released today, requires CCGs to produce plans by 23 December about how they will deliver the GP Forward View as part of the ongoing sustainability and transformation plans (STPs).
This will need to set out how CCGs will invest funds to support and transform general practice in complement with work taking place nationally, in order to deliver on commitments such as improving resilience and expanding the workforce.
NHS England also announced that general practice will receive further local recurrent funding to boost capacity, totalling £138m by 2017-18 and increasing to £258m in 2018-19.
In the current financial year, it said this recurrent funding “is being made available to the GP Access Fund pilot schemes” and a “number of additional areas across the country which will accelerate delivery of improving GP access in 2017-18”. This will also allow London to kick-start a capital-wide programme of access improvement already from 2016-17.
The investment will then be extended in 2018-19 to allow the whole country to develop extra capacity, so that from April 2019 every CCG can “expect a minimum additional £6 per head to improve access to general practice”.
These changes are expected to allow CCGs to commission more services, perhaps including provision of access to pre-bookable and same-day appointments to GP services in the evening and at weekends.
Arvind Madan, NHS England’s director of primary care, explained: “We know that general practice is under pressure and we are determined to maintain the momentum in turning things around, as started with the launch of the General Practice Forward View.
“Today’s planning guidance, with detail on how investment will look in the coming years, demonstrates the steps we will be taking with CCGs to both stabilise and transform GP services in the years to come, for the benefit of staff and patients.”
NHS England’s planning guidance spans two financial years for the first time ever in an attempt to provide greater stability, as well as underpins the two-year tariff and two-year NHS standard contract.