Emma Bower

speaker

1,286 appearances 13 recordings 1 series first heard May 2026 last heard 14 Aug

Emma Bower’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 13 in all, peaking in Jun 2026 with 5.

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Talking General Practice · BMA to ballot on ‘plan B’ for GP contracts, NHS workforce plan, single patient record fears · 29 May 2026 podcast

But the F T story did say that the draft version of the plan that it had seen said there voice-verified

wouldn't be a substantial increase in doctor numbers, but rather a focus on shifting doctors out of hospitals and into the community. voice-verified

And the priority would be given to training and recruiting staff who work in the community, including GPs. voice-verified

In fact, according to that draft the FT saw, voice-verified

the plan at that point said that up to forty nine thousand more GPs might be needed by twenty thirty five and that rise in GP numbers would come at the expense of those working in hospitals. voice-verified

And if that's true, you know, that is an absolute huge increase. voice-verified

And it raises all sorts of questions about funding for general practice, estates, infrastructure, training, massive questions that the government would have to answer if that GP workforce increase is its aim. voice-verified

But all of those issues were ignored in the previous workforce plan and I would find it a surprise if this new plan actually addressed those really fundamental issues. voice-verified

Yeah, as you said, we're expecting it quite soon, so we'll need to wait and see exactly what it says. voice-verified

Yeah, well it covers quite a number of things. voice-verified

I'm sure a lot of people will have heard about this, but just to quickly run through them, they can broadly sort of be broken down into four areas really. voice-verified

So this is the legislation that will scrap voice-verified

NHS England and move those functions into the Department of Health and Social Care. voice-verified

There are also some changes to ICBs that I'll mention a little bit later. voice-verified

The second thing is the bill will also scrap Health Watch and move the national health watch functions into a new patient directorate in the Department of Health and Social Care. voice-verified

Local health watch functions will be transferred into ICBs, and the other thing around that is the health services safety. voice-verified

Investigations body, that's going to merge into the CQC. voice-verified

This is the legislation that will enable that to happen. voice-verified

There are quite significant new powers given to the Secretary of State under this bill, and I think you know some of that's going to be quite contentious. voice-verified

So the Health and Social Care Secretary will be able to issue new directions to ICBs, cap the amount NHS trusts can spend, have more freedom to remove NHS foundation trust status, and potentially fire individual directors in trusts, and also have a say over who should be appointed to ICBs. voice-verified

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