Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what additional support he (a) has made and (b) plans to make to support GPs experiencing acute increases in demand on their services as a result of the covid-19 outbreak.

To support general practice, we have extended the General Practice Covid Capacity Expansion Fund, making £120 million available from April to September 2021, further to £150 million allocated from November 2020 to March 2021. This is ring-fenced exclusively for use in general practice, for priorities including increasing general practitioner (GP) numbers and capacity, identifying and supporting patients with ‘long’ COVID-19 and continuing to support clinically extremely vulnerable patients. Furthermore, the January 2021 interim GP Contract agreement for 2021/22 provides stability and assurance to general practice to allow a focus on the COVID-19 response, including the vaccination programme, while supporting the recovery of long-term condition management.

General practice receives additional funding and comprehensive support from NHS England and NHS Improvement to deliver the COVID-19 vaccine programme. However, to ensure that patients can continue to access primary care as we move into phase two of the programme, NHS England and NHS Improvement are asking practices to confirm that they have capacity to continue to deliver their core services alongside the programme in order to continue to take part.