NHS revokes premises commitments depriving GPs of millions 

The declaration has arisen at the same time as the government announced that it will overhaul its £1bn fund. Pulse has revealed that, so far, at least 11 practices in the South West have already been told they will no longer receive money that had previously been ‘approved’ to carry out work to the premises.

The General Practitioners Committee (GPC) has said that ‘large numbers’ of improvements have yet to begin, as the scheme has been ‘fraught with delays and administrative hurdles’.

NHS England maintains that no bids have been withdrawn to those that were given ‘full approval’, but it is possible they have ‘simply been deferred’. Changes to the scheme mean that those bids will now have to gain clinical commissioning group (CCG) approval, which GPs fear will not be automatic and may cause delays.

In March, NHS England announced that 1,000 practices had their plans for premises improvements approved for funding in 2015/16. Plans intend to prioritise outstanding bids that could be accomplished quickly, including fixtures that would support seven-day working and care of the elderly.

However, recent plans were announced to alter the scheme, which would see CCGs approving schemes based on a set of criteria. The criteria includes: increased capacity for primary care services out of hospital; commitment to a wider range of services as set out in commissioning intentions to reduce unplanned admissions to hospital; improving seven-day access to effective care and increased training capacity.

Dr Simon Bradley, chair of Avon LMC, said his Concord Medical Centre practice has had the promise of a grant of more than £1.5m revoked, having been given approval to proceed in June this year.

He said: “Out of the blue I got a phone call saying, ‘what it amounts to is your money has been pulled’, and I’ve had a subsequent email confirming that telephone conversation.”

He continued to say that the practice had put a ‘considerable amount of money and time in this project’, and the decision ‘will directly impact on patient care in our practice area’.

Dr Bradley added: “We were told that the same conversation that NHS England had with us had been had with another ten practices. And therefore we don’t believe we’re the only one.”

However, NHS England has contested that these schemes were never given final approval despite the letters to proceed, and that regular regional panels are reviewing the schemes nationally.

A spokesperson for NHS England said: “We’re not aware of any bids that have received full approval and subsequently had it withdrawn, some have simply been deferred as their business case isn’t fully developed.

“This came to light during the approval process before funding was committed. The development of business cases does take time and effort for GP practices and we’re supporting them wherever we can.”

But Dr Bradley said there was ‘no guarantee’ that they would get approval from the CCGs next year.

A GPC spokesperson told Pulse: “We are compiling examples where there have been issues with the programme, but we aren’t ready to release these at this stage.”

GPC chair Dr Chaand Nagpaul said: “The promise to allocate £250m annually from 2015/16 to improve GP premises was supposed to address this fundamental problem.

“Unfortunately, the reality on the ground is that the scheme has been fraught with delays and administrative hurdles, with large numbers of promised improvements to GP practices across the country yet to start.”

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