MP calls for action over GPs

Wearside MP Bridget Phillipson has challenged Government ministers to take action over GP shortages.

During Health Questions in the Commons, the Labour MP for Houghton and Sunderland South, said there had been a 25% drop in the number of full-time family doctors in Sunderland since 2013.

Last year, the Government announced an extra 1,500 medical training places would be available to students each year from September 2018.

Ms Phillipson pressed the new Parliamentary UnderSecretary of State for Health, Steve Brine MP, to ensure that some places were allocated to areas of greatest need.

She is also supporting an ongoing application by the University of Sunderland to open a new medical school in the city that will specialise in training students in the delivery of general practice.

After the session, she said: “I challenged ministers to get a grip on the GP crisis in Sunderland.

“There is strong evidence that doctors are more likely to stay and work where they have trained, so I called on the Government to support the University of Sunderland’s application to open a new medical school in the city that will specialise in general practice.

“Ministers need to make sure that some of the 1,000 new medical training places are allocated to new medical schools such as Sunderland where there is the greatest need to recruit and retain GPs.

“Existing medical schools have been allocated 500 places even though they are often located in areas where there are already a surplus of family doctors. It cannot be right that areas like Sunderland are still missing out.”