10.03.11
Criticism of English NHS reforms – from Scotland
The leader of Scotland’s GPs has “sent a message” to doctors and politicians in England, urging them to reject the NHS reforms.
Dr Dean Marshall, chairman of the BMA’s Scottish General Practitioners Committee, said the planned changes in England would commercialise the NHS and increase competition between GP providers.
Speaking at the Annual Conference of Scottish Local Medical Committees (LMCs) in Clydebank, he said: “I want to send a message to our politicians in both England and Scotland. Our health service is not a factory, the health service cannot be treated like a commercial enterprise, our patients are not a commodity. We do not support the market-based reforms being pushed through in England, where the consequences for patients could be severe indeed. Scotland’s GPs will support colleagues in England to preserve the founding principles of the NHS.”
Marshall for a new strategy to drive general practice forward in Scotland, and urged the Scottish Government to work in partnership with GPs.
He said: “Without a government strategy, how can we in general practice, the cornerstone of the NHS, drive change and improvements in the quality of care for patients without any clear direction of where we are going?
“We have begun this process with the publication of our own policy document, but we still have a long way to go to convince politicians of the contribution that GPs can make to the improvement of care for patients. We still have to convince politicians that clinical leadership by those delivering the service is the way forward. We still have to convince politicians to put patient care before political priority.
“I want general practice to be all it can be. I want us all to have a clear policy direction to ensure that, when our newly elected politicians enter the parliament in May, we can work with them to deliver general practice that is capable of meeting the increasing health challenges of this country.”
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