There will be a ‘guaranteed’ increase in the global sum in the 2019/20 financial year, on top of the other funding settlements announced as part of the new five-year GP contract announced yesterday, the BMA has said.
The global sum for 2019/20 has not yet been decided, but it will be an increase on the £88 per patient that practices currently receive.
This will be on top of the other funding announcements, including the £2 per patient direct enhanced service (DES) for practices to join a network and the state indemnity scheme.
The global sum uplift will also include money from the removal of seniority pay and MPIG.
Dr Richard Vautrey, chair of the BMA GP Committee, told Pulse: ’The 1.4% uplift is for the core practice level contract. This includes an increase in global sum despite the introduction of state-backed indemnity, as well as investment in other areas.
As the precise global sum calculation is reliant on a number of other factors, for example recycling MPIG and seniority, we will be calculating a definitive figure for the global sum uplift and releasing this in the coming weeks.’
The full agreement between the BMA GP Committee and NHS England said that the ‘core contract’ will increase by almost £1bn by 2023/24, with a £109m increase this coming year, followed by a further £187m increase the following year.
The reason for the lower increase next year is due to the need to fund the state indemnity scheme, which will cover the costs of all practice staff and GPs.
The BMA said the £405m provided for 2019/20 means practices would be able to increase staff pay by at least 2%.
Under the contract, there will be funding uplifts to the global sum of around 1.5% a year, which can be adjusted if the economy experiences particularly high or low inflation.
In addition, the new ‘practice participation’ DES will account for funding worth an extra circa 1.5% increase on the total core contract a year.
This is on top of the funding for the state-backed indemnity scheme.
Increase to core GP contract per year
- 2019/20: £109m
- 2020/21: £187m
- 2021/22: £229m
- 2022/23: £216m
- 2023/24: £237m
(Total uplift over the five years: £978m)
This story was first published on our sister publication Pulse.
