The doctors’ pay review body has recommended a 6% pay uplift for salaried GPs and partners this year, according to the BMA’s sessional GP committee chair.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves confirmed in a statement to the House of Commons yesterday that the Government will ‘accept in full’ the recommendations of the ‘independent pay review bodies’.
Ahead of this, BMA sessional GP committee chair Dr Mark Steggles told our sister title Pulse that the Review Body on Doctors’ and Dentists’ Remuneration (DDRB) recommended a 6% pay rise for salaried GPs.
In a post on X, he said: ‘Whilst government have rightly recognised the need to reverse pay erosion for many doctors in the NHS, GP pay uplifts are falling far behind those offered to their secondary care colleagues. Despite GP pay erosion up to 25%. 6% is wholly inadequate.’
Last year, the Government accepted the DDRB’s recommendation of a 6% uplift for NHS staff, including salaried GPs and trainees but not partners.
This year the DDRB has been asked for a recommendation on uplifts for GP partners for the first time in five years.
This means the DDRB recommendations and Government response are likely to result in an uplift to core funding.
NHS England advised in February that a ‘further uplift’ to the contract – beyond the 1.9% uplift for this year – may be made based on the Government’s response to the DDRB report.
The BMA GP Committee England has previously predicted that this additional uplift would amount to 4%, based on conversations with the previous Conservative primary care minister Andrea Leadsom.
In her statement, Ms Reeves said that when the last spending review was conducted, it was ‘assumed that pay awards would be 2% this year’.
She blamed the previous Conservative Government for failing to provide guidance to the pay review bodies on the affordability of pay uplifts.
The chancellor continued: ‘I will not repeat their mistakes. Where the previous Government provided no transparency to the public and no certainty for public services, we will be open about the decisions needed and the steps that we are taking.
‘That begins with accepting in full the recommendations of the independent pay review bodies and the details of these awards are being published today.
‘That is the right decision for the people who work in, and most importantly, the people who use, our public services. Giving hard-working staff the pay rises they deserve, while ensuring that we can recruit and retain the people we need.’
Offer to end strike action
Meanwhile, it was also announced this week that the BMA’s junior doctors committee will put a new Government offer to members which would increase pay by 22.3% over two years.
This would include a backdated pay rise of 4.05% for 2023/24, on top of the existing increase of between 8.8% and 10.3%.
For the current financial year, junior doctors will receive an average 8% increase via the pay review body’s recommendation of 6% as well as a consolidated payment of £1,000. Overall, the pay offer equates to a 22.3% pay rise across 2023/24 and 2024/25.
If accepted by members at a referendum, this would bring an end to junior doctor industrial action in England, which first began in March last year.
A version of this story was first published on our sister title Pulse.
