GP recruitment drive a ‘failure’

A Scottish Government initiative to boost GP numbers has resulted in the recruitment of 18 doctors since it launched two years ago, according to figures highlighted by the Conservatives.

The party said the “handful” of new appointments from the GP Recruitment and Retention Programme will “barely have had any impact at all”.

It is calling on ministers to ensure that 11% of NHS funding goes straight to general practice to help surgeries address shortages.

The Royal College of General Practitioners (Scotland) predicts a shortfall of more than 850 GPS by 2021.

Tory health spokesman Miles Briggs said: “It’s no wonder Scotland is in the grip of a general practice crisis when the SNP Government fails so miserably to attract doctors to the job.

“This is just another blatant failing of the SNP workforce planning, and the consequences on the ground are a population struggling to get a GP appointment, and those family doctors who are left feeling the strain.”

The three-year GP Recruitment and Retention Programme was set up by the Government in 2015 with £2.5 million of funding.

Figures show the scheme has helped recruit five GPS in NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, three in NHS Ayrshire and Arran, two in NHS Borders, one in NHS Lothian and seven in NHS Tayside.