General Practice: Investment and Reform Package 2025-26

General practice is the cornerstone of our national health service, providing essential care to communities day in, day out, managing pressures across the healthcare system, and playing a pivotal role in delivering care closer to home.

On Friday 20 December 2024, I wrote to general practices to update them on proposals for the GP contract for 2025-26. I was pleased to confirm that general practice will receive a funding uplift of £889 million in 2025-26, representing a 7.2% cash growth and estimated real terms growth of 4.8%. This marks the largest funding uplift for general practice since the start of the five- year framework and demonstrates this Government’s commitment to delivering a neighbourhood health service—one of our key manifesto pledges.

I fully recognise the financial pressures general practice has faced in recent years. Despite the challenging fiscal backdrop this Government inherited, we have made the necessary decision to ensure additional resources are allocated to primary care. This uplift to general practice reflects this Government’s commitment to bring back the family doctor, end the 8 am scramble and put general practice at the heart of the neighbourhood health service. It will support critical reforms which will make it easier for patients to get an appointment with the same doctor—particularly those with long- term conditions—and help us shift from treatment to prevention, by going harder on tackling the biggest killers. I also wanted to take the opportunity to reassure newly qualified GPs employed through the ARRS scheme, announced last year, that they will continue to be supported throughout 2025-26 to sustain care delivery.

General practice is central to our plans for health service reform with the patient at the centre. This funding uplift represents a vital step towards the “left shift” in care, ensuring that primary and community care receive a greater share of NHS funding and are able to deliver more care closer to home. There are already hundreds more full-time GPs in post than when the Government took office, reflecting the progress made in strengthening the workforce and meaningful progress towards improving access and outcomes for all.

Alongside the announcement of the funding uplift, the consultation with the General Practitioners Committee in England (GPC England) of the British Medical Association (BMA) on the 2025-26 GP contract began in December. This consultation provides a forum to discuss important proposed changes aimed at improving patient care and experience, by reducing inefficiencies, streamlining processes, and enabling general practice to deliver improved patient outcomes. The final reforms will be announced following the conclusion of the consultation in 2025, and I will keep the House updated.

These actions reflect our commitment to addressing the immediate pressures facing general practice while also laying the foundations for long-term reform. Through increased investment and meaningful changes, we expect GPs to deliver better access, improved continuity of care, and strengthened support for elective recovery.

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