Giving new providers the chance to compete for contracts would increase access to primary care, the confederation said. Its comments come in response to a Scottish Government consultation on eligibility criteria for providers of primary care services.
Assistant director David Lonsdale said CBI Scotland feared that ‘dogmatic opposition' to letting new independent providers offer GP services would mean patients lose out.
‘We urge the devolved government to reconsider its trenchant position on this issue and drop its plans to legislate to ban firms from providing GP services,' he said.
‘GPs are themselves usually private contractors to the NHS, so the attempt by ministers to make this a ‘public versus private' issue is as unhelpful as it is misguided,' he added. ‘Patients, and not politicians or healthcare professionals, ought to be the priority.'
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