GP leaders have threatened industrial action after rejecting the latest “insulting” contract offer from NHS England.

The British Medical Association said NHS England had failed to offer adequate funding to cover practice inflation costs and the rising pressures on services. Its GP committee, which met yesterday, said it would consider industrial action and collective action if there was not a better offer.Unnamed NHS sources, quoted in national papers, said they were surprised at the vote on the grounds that talks over the GP contract were far from over.

It is the second time in three years that GP’s have threatened some kind of industrial action. The profession voted on action two years ago after a confrontation with the government over the lifting of lockdown measures. Since then GP conferences have voted to withdraw from primary care networks – but this has never been implemented.

Dr Kieran Sharrock, acting chair of the BMA’s GP committee in England, said: “This year’s offer is a slap in the face of hardworking GPs and patients across the country. To offer nothing to meet the spiralling costs of running practices as inflation runs rife, and teams continue to do more with less, is insulting to staff and unsafe for patients.

“Last year, practices in England delivered 329 million appointments – 17 million more than in 2019, before the pandemic. Two-thirds of these were face-to-face and 85% took place within two weeks of booking. Yet the Government, via NHS England, continues to tell us we’re not working hard enough, and puts further unreachable targets and political soundbites ahead of safe, quality care. With inflation remaining stubbornly high, burdening practices with rising expenses for bills, staff and services, this offer will lead partners to question the very viability of practices and their ability to continue trying to provide safe care to their patients. When we’ve lost more than 400 practices in England since 2019, impacting millions of patients, we cannot afford to lose any more.”

He added: “In rejecting this offer we are standing up for both the future of the profession and the safe care of patients. General practice can no longer be expected to take whatever is thrown at it. If there is no change in approach from this Government, it will preside over the death of general practice as we know it.”