Primary Care Staff Numbers

16. What progress his Department has made on increasing the number of primary care staff.

19. What steps is he taking to increase the number of GPs.

20. What progress his Department has made on increasing the number of primary care staff.

Since March 2019, GPs have recruited over 25,000 staff such as pharmacists, physiotherapists and mental health practitioners, and we are on track to hit our 26,000 additional staff commitment.

As a doctor myself, I will be very happy to see one of those many fantastic professionals the Secretary of State mentioned, including pharmacists and physios, in the primary care setting, but I understand from local GPs that patients do not always have the confidence to do that and 111 is not necessarily directing people to see the wider team. Can we ensure 111 is set up to direct people to different professionals, and can we do something to promote and educate the public on how fantastic that wider healthcare team is in primary care?

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, which is why I commissioned through NHS England a review of 111. It was initially designed for a different purpose. That allows the GP service to be the front door it has become in the NHS. Through the chief executive of Milton Keynes University Hospital, we have done significant work on the NHS app, so it can better enable patients to get to the right place for the care they need.

In January, over 45,000 people in Oxfordshire waited more than two weeks to see their GP and 12,000 waited over a month. The top reason given when I visited surgeries was that they simply cannot recruit the doctors they need. For example, Kennington health centre has been forced to close part time because it cannot find a replacement for a retiring partner. That is clearly unsustainable. Will the Secretary of State consider introducing a weighting for GPs in areas of high cost of living outside London? Will he meet me to discuss the specific issues in Oxfordshire?

The hon. Member is right to highlight the pressure on primary care, which is why, in the answer I gave a moment ago, I said it is also about looking at the wider skills mix within primary care. She mentions doctors specifically. We have 2,200 more doctors in general practice than before the pandemic. It is about having the right skills mix alongside the doctors to meet the significant increased demand since the pandemic.

Demand for GP appointments in Oxfordshire is indeed acute. It is driven in part by the need to continue to treat people with long-term medical conditions. Will my right hon. Friend consider what can be done to rebalance the system, so that instead of dealing with people when they present with acute symptoms, more is done to ensure people can be treated at the primary and community level?

My hon. Friend highlights an absolutely brilliant point, one I am extremely seized of, which is: how do we get detection much sooner, looking at genomics, screening and identifying issues before the patient is even necessarily aware that they have a condition. Early care delivers far better patient outcomes but it is also far cheaper to deliver. That prevention, as he highlights, is extremely important.

The primary care crisis in Plymouth is getting worse, but there is a cross-party solution in Plymouth, which is to build a new super health hub, the Cavell centre, in the city centre. The Government have withdrawn the £41 million funding for that, but the Minister’s predecessor offered to put pressure on Devon’s integrated care board to see what could be funded locally and whether there is a national-local partnership that could deliver this pioneering pilot project, which could really improve healthcare in Plymouth that would be a model for the rest of the country. Will the Secretary of State look at Devon’s ICB and whether he could put pressure on that ICB to fund that pioneering project?

The hon. Gentleman reasonably highlights that the commissioning is a decision for the ICB, but also rightly draws attention to the opportunity to look at different models, for example, how we look across communities at economies of scale, and how we combine that with modern methods of construction to deliver projects far more quickly. I am happy to look, with Devon ICB, at the issue he raises.

I really welcome the increase in patient care staff in GP practices in my constituency, but can I appeal to the Secretary of State to fix the problem with the taxation of GPs’ pensions, which is forcing many into early retirement just when we need their services the most?

My right hon. Friend is a very experienced parliamentarian and will know that issues of tax are a matter for my right hon. Friend the Chancellor, but I draw her attention to “Our plan for patients”, which sets out a package of NHS pension scheme measures.

NHS dentists form a really important part of the primary care workforce. However, in places such as York, we have a complete desert, where my constituents just cannot receive NHS dentistry. What is the Secretary of State going to do for my constituents, so that their oral health needs are addressed?

We will set out to the House in due course a recovery plan to deal in particular with primary care but also dentistry. We recognise that, notwithstanding the fiscal support that was offered to protect dentistry through the pandemic, it is an area of acute interest across the House. The Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, my hon. Friend the Member for Harborough (Neil O’Brien), will be saying more on that very shortly.