Instead, we need longer GP training (extending from three to four years), with trainees focusing on key specialties that are needed in the community, such as dermatology, musculoskeletal medicine, palliative care and psychiatry.
Whether it's missed waiting time targets for patients with cancer, predictions from the Royal College of GPs that parts of the country could become GP ghost towns, or assertions that if the NHS were a plane, it would "fall out of the sky".
Related: I faced a difficult choice – become a GP or give up on a career in the NHS The GP who gives his home phone number to palliative care patients' families at weekends in case they need him.
More GPs with special interests (GPWSIs) are needed to offer expertise and support to the wider GP community.
Speaking at a GP surgery in the West Midlands on Monday, he promised more GPs, faster access to new drugs and treatments and a greater focus on mental health and healthy living.
You need to know how to use it, so ask your GP.
The announcement would mark the beginning of what Smith and his fellow GP Sarah Chalmers say was one of the town's worst ever years, with affected residents coming through the doors of Nhulunbuy's only GP clinic.
In general, non-urgent consultant-to-consultant referrals are no longer carried out, and this means patients are referred back to their GP.
This change has been implemented by CCGs and creates unnecessary delay, as the patient is going back and forth between GP and hospital.
The company, which is the largest provider of urgent care services in the country, already operates the Suffolk out-of-hours GP and dental service and recently started providing NHS 111 services in Hillingdon and Croydon.
Under national targets, patients with suspected cancer must start their treatment within 62 days of a GP referral.
