To ask the Minister of Health for an update on any work being undertaken to address the issues that people are having in accessing GP appointments.

I recognise the importance of access to GP services for patients. In response to increasing patient demand GPs are utilising a mixed consultation model with telephone consultations, video and face to face consultations as a means of managing the rising demand on services within the existing workforce while retaining responsiveness to those patients who need the most urgent attention and care.

As independent contractors, who provide primary medical services to their registered list of patients under the terms of the General Medical Services Contracts Regulations, and clinical professionals, GPs are responsible for making appropriate decisions about the treatment, care and management of individual patients. This also means that decisions about the day to day running of the surgery, including the use of technology, telephony and the appointment system, are determined locally by the GP practice within the constraints of their available workforce.

Additional measures have been put in place to support primary care to adapt flexibly to increasing demand. These include focusing on increasing capacity to meet the demand from patients through, for example, reinforcing the GP workforce and increasing the range of healthcare professionals working in primary care, investment in general practice and the implementation of new and innovative ways of working, including making greater use of technology and telephony.

In recent years the Department has made significant funding available to enable GPs to improve their telephony systems, improve accessibility and employ additional staff to ensure telephony demand is managed effectively.

As part of supporting work in this area, my Department has also established a GP Access Working Group to explore issues relating to access to services and develop a programme of work to help address these and improve the experience for patients.

The Working Group includes representatives from General Practice and service users among its membership. As part of this, work has commenced on developing guidance for practices in management of patient demand and optimising workflow within practices to maximise efficiency. The Group is also considering how technology can help to deliver improvements to the process for accessing services for patients and practices alike.