Fuck Me We're Paying GPs £250,000 A Year?? No Wonder NHS Ran Out Of Money

[Don Rizzle]

GPs 'earn up to £250,000 a year'
Some GPs are earning as much as £250,000 a year after expenses under their new contract, the BBC has found.
GP wages have risen by up to 25% since the contracts were introduced in 2004, according to specialist accounts.

The figures come from an annual survey by the Association of Independent Specialist Medical Accountants due out later this month.

Experts have said the contract was ill devised and is partly responsible for current NHS deficits.


 There are thousands of people who are alive and well today as a direct result of this new contract
Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt
 

The results of the survey of earnings suggest the average annual income for GPs could rise to £120,000 before tax.

But the figures also give evidence that some GPs are earning up to £250,000.

GPs, however, say only a tiny minority earn that much. They argue their income had to be boosted, as it had fallen below that of other comparable professionals.

Overspends

One accountancy firm in the north-east of England said it has just under 10 GPs earning between £200,000 and £250,000 a year.

The survey is the first of its kind since the GP contract came into effect between April and December 2004.


 It does not look like a terribly good deal at the moment for the taxpayer and the patient
Niall Dickson, King's Fund 

Policy experts have said the government miscalculated its sums when it negotiated the deal.

The Department of Health has confirmed the current overspend on GPs is £300m.

Dr Prit Buttar, a GP in Abingdon in Oxfordshire, told the BBC Radio 4's Today programme that the new contract was proving to be very lucrative.

The partners in his 10,000-patient practice now earn in excess of £100,000 a year after expenses - a rise of around 20%.

He said, for instance, his practice now received funds for monitoring cholesterol and blood pressure levels of patients with heart disease.

"It is something that we were doing already. There are elements of it where it is frankly bean-counting for its own sake - and I don't think anybody would pretend otherwise."

Complex businesses

However, Dr Hamish Meldrum, lead GP negotiator for the British Medical Association, told the BBC average GP earnings were a bit below £100,000 a year.

He said the new contract was needed because GPs' earnings had fallen below those of other comparable professionals.


 HAVE YOUR SAY
GPs provide a service that can not be provided by any other profession
Lewis, Milton Keynes
 

Dr Meldrum said some GPs were earning more money because they were now running a complex business.

He said: "The government has been encouraging GPs to expand to run super surgeries to grow bigger.

"There will be a few GPs who are at the top of these and primarily they are getting that sort of money for actually running quite a complex business rather than necessarily providing health care."

Tony Blair defended big pay rises for GPs and nurses.

He said: "When people say why have you spent so much on nurses and doctors' pay, I say because it's right we make our GPs the best paid in Europe, and boost nurses' pay and conditions, which is why number of doctors in training is up over 68%, and nurses by 67%."

Patricia Hewitt, the Health Secretary, said GP pay was now tied to the work they actually did, rather than the size of their patient list.

"There are thousands of people who are alive and well today as a direct result of this new contract.

"This is an enormous improvement in health care, and it is the kind of preventive health care that the public want."

But she said: "I would be very surprised if there were a lot of GPs earning £250,000 purely from the NHS."

Productivity

Niall Dickson, from the independent health think tank the King's Fund, said patients were unlikely to support huge pay increases for GPs.

"All the suggestions are that GPs are being paid more money, but overall we have not seen a big increase in productivity, indeed we may have seen a down in productivity because of shut surgeries on Saturday mornings, and no responsibility for 24 hour cover.

"It does not look like a terribly good deal at the moment for the taxpayer and the patient."

Joyce Robins, of the pressure group Patient Concern, said the BMA had struck a splendid deal for its members.

"GPs are now paid piece-meal, a few thousand for reaching this target, a few thousand for that. It has created an atmosphere where it seems that every time a GP picks up a pen or looks at a computer, it must have a price tag."


Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/health/4917454.stm

Published: 2006/04/18 07:39:54 GMT

© BBC MMVI

[No Compute]

I doubt the majority of GP's earn anywhere near that and anyway GP's are atleast more deserving of a salary like that than people in other professions (eg. actors, sports stars etc.)

[Don Rizzle]

I doubt the majority of GP's earn anywhere near that and anyway GP's are atleast more deserving of a salary like that than people in other professions (eg. actors, sports stars etc.)

yea but its my tax money thats paying for it!

[Don Seer]

uhh..i thoguth there was a story where a lot of this money.. and the money that doctors earns comes frmo drugs companies effectively paying them to advise certain drugs since other aspects of the drug market are so regulated..

[virtuoso]

So much is little known for a start every doctor gets about 15,000 from the drug companies from the pharmaceutical companies. However to blame the doctors for the state of this countries national health system is absolute bullshit. Our hospitals are turning into third world hospitals, a good friend of mine told me that when his son went into hospital in Nottingham to have a bone graft on his leg they said there was am 82% chance of him getting a bug. The lady who lived on her own round the corner from me unfortunately had an accident and broke her hip she went into hospital and whilst in hospital she contracted the so called hospital super bug MRSI she has now lost all feeling in her legs and is now crippled for life. It makes me sick to the very pit of my stomach that they talk about the NHS being hundreds of millions of pounds worth of debts when they scandalously spent over one billion on a piece of crap called the millenium dome. Yet when questioned about it they just shrug it off as a mistake!. Our hospitals are dirty, are killing and crippling people left right and centre.

Also on top of that three of the hospitals here in the West Midlands are set to close the closure of the princess royal hospital will result in the loss of 600 jobs. Now around here peoples only choice is a hospital which is double the distance from them and in a case of an emergency quickness of arrival is vital. Also you have to recognise that power is so centralised management on top of management on top of management and for what? what has it achieved. Also on the subject of scandalous costs it is apparently a human right for someone to have a sex change operation to have breast implants and god knows what else and yet its not a human right for there to be enough hospital beds and a hospital close by.

However we can all look forward to an attack on Iran which those criminals are well underway in orchestrating and then the media can once again overlook the woes that people in this country are suffering and turn its attentions elsewhere again. This country is such a bullshit contradiction, the 5th largest economy in the world and yet we havent got enough money to provide real health care and they are talking about a pensions crisis also. I wish people would stop denying that money isnt being literally syphoned off, look at all these building contracts for new hospitals which end up costing 3 times more than original budgeted for example, there is rampant fraud going on.