According to figures released by the Department of Health (DH) last month, the Government’s spending on GP services declined by 2.3 per cent in the last tax year compared with 2012/13.

Despite overall DH spend increasing by 2.6 per cent, the total spend on general medical services (GMS), private medical services (PMS) and non-GMS GP services dropped to £7.55bn in 2013/14 from £7.73bn the year before.

According to GP leaders, the DH figures showed a lack of regard for the increased workload faced by GPs amid dwindling resources, such as cuts to the Minimum Practice Income Guarantee (MPIG) and the withdrawal of PMS reviews.

The Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) and the British Medical Association (BMA) are running parallel campaigns for the Government to increase spend on GP services.

The RCGP’s campaign, called Put patients first: Back general practice is calling for the overall spend of the NHS budget on GP services to rise from between seven and eight per cent to 11 per cent by 2017.

Meanwhile, the BMA’s Your GP Cares campaign, which aims to get the public to lobby on behalf of GPs, aims to relieve unsustainable financial and workload pressures on GPs.

The BMA hopes that engaged patients will push politicians to put funding towards attracting new GPs, retaining leavers and expanding overall GP numbers, as well as expanding practice nurse workforces and also pay for premises upgrades.

At the same time, the General Practitioners’ Committee (GPC) will be stepping up lobbying efforts to ensure that MPs are aware of practices that are at risk of closure due to funding swings such as MPIG cuts.