Salaried GPs will no longer be required to publish their earnings thanks to BMA intervention, Pulse reports.
Last year NHS England had forced through a requirement in the GP contract for all partners, salaried GPs and GP locums who earned £150,000 or more in pensionable income to be publicly listed ‘by name and earning bands’.
Then on Thursday – the day before the deadline by which GPs had to disclose their income – the BMA made sessional GPs exempt.
But the BMA advises that the amended regulations will still oblige many GPs to disclose their income. They list “any clinical sub-contractor including locum GPs if an individual or a partnership, but not if a company” and “any clinical services provider”.
The union’s guidance also warns that although the contract regulations cannot make someone who is not party to the core contract declare their earnings, they still require the practice to include terms within any sub-contract to require the sub-contractor, an individual or the partners of a partnership, to declare their earnings. A GP locum would then also be subject to the disclosure requirement.
Dr Richard Fieldhouse, NASGP chair, said: “We very much welcome the BMA’s success here in relation to salaried GPs. But for locums, these regulations remain a pointless, badly timed and Ill thought out measure that will do absolutely nothing to progress the relationship between GPs and the public.
“I will be amazed if any locum is actually worried about this as it is practically impossible to earn that sort of income from GP locum work alone.
“Even if it was possible, the regulation’s wording is unclear, and could allow for a high earning locum to earn some of their income through their own Limited company – which they may wish to do anyway to reduce NHS pension-related tax issues.
“And enforcing these regulations through a contract between the locum and practice is unlikely to be effective. Even if the practice were to suspect that the locum had such a high income, and to then challenge a non-disclosure, it is being left up to the practice to remedy any breach. Are they going to stop the locum from working there?”
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