Last Thursday, GPC (GPs committee) England met at BMA House for the first meeting of 2026; this week marked ‘Blue Monday’ – the lowest emotional point of the winter. You won’t be alone in struggling to find the joy in general practice currently, especially given the relentless online demand and respiratory illnesses, which have taken their toll on practices and GPs nationwide.
We are seeing some of our busiest days, with record numbers of patient contacts leaving us feeling unsafe and unsupported – taking us further away from face-to-face continuity of care with our patients, the true bedrock of general practice. We see and hear the immense effort you’re putting into adjusting staffing, systems, and subcontracting arrangements following on from October. We’re also grateful to those of you raising concerns about the sustainability and safety of the implementation. Your GPCE representatives discussed managing pressure, particularly when demand consistently outstrips capacity, and when we inevitably encounter situations where full compliance with the three access modes across the full hours of the day is just not feasible.
To this end, we will be holding two webinars at the end of the month – these will be of most interest to GMS contractors but will be open to all GPs – please sign up below.
This week your elected officer team will be meeting DHSC and NHSE to press on with discussions around the Government’s consultation on the 2026/27 GMS contract and discussing our recent practice finance survey results, and we shall be following up again with NHS England the week after too. Following these discussions once a final contract has been proposed, GPC England will vote on the final offer.
The committee also received:
- feedback from national GP focus groups – painting a widespread bleak midwinter picture –overworked, under-resourced, but importantly, still feeling the sense of value and pride in the work GPs do for our patients
- a keynote speaker from the Irish Medical Organisation who provided an overview of the GMS contract in the Republic of Ireland and the experience of negotiating their public/private 2019 contract
- breakout groups to consider next steps in our contract dispute, with reflections from our team of external strategic advisers with whom we are working on the new GMS contract.
We know how vital these discussions are to the whole profession. We want your feedback and to bring you along with us, so please do join us either over lunch on Wednesday, or on Thursday evening:
- Wednesday 28 January, 12–2pm, register here
- Thursday 29 January, 7–9pm, register here