The Government has announced a number of proposed changes to improve the NHS Pension scheme, including a consultation on pension flexibility, a commitment to review the impact of the Annual Allowance taper and guidance to employers setting out how existing flexibilities can be used to ensure doctors do not lose out.  The BMA has led the change against damaging tax legislation and in response to the announcement, Chaand Nagpaul, BMA Council Chair, said: "We acknowledge this step forward by the Government."  However, he went on to say: "The new proposed flexibilities will provide short-term relief for many doctors, but they themselves do not tackle the core and underlying problem."

The Home Office has published a consultation on draft guidelines for police issuing firearms licences. This will ensure officers are consistently checking applicants' medical fitness to hold a licence and have signed an agreement with the BMA and will provide greater protection for GPs who choose to place a firearms flag on the medical record.

Yet another failure by Capita/PCSE was made known to GPC this week.  In response, GPC have again demanded that Capita be stripped of its contract to supply GP support services after the company admitted further administration errors.  In this latest event, correspondence sent to three email inboxes were left unprocessed for around two years. While Capita has not confirmed the total number of emails which went unprocessed, the BMA understands that it is in the region of thousands.

As highlighted last week, the DHSC (Department of Health and Social Care) and NHSR (NHS Resolution) have confirmed a change in cover provided by CNSGP with the supply and administration of paid for travel vaccinations no longer included. Following our representations DHSC and NHS England have committed to ensure that any general practice staff who were administering travel vaccinations and immunisations (where patients were charged a fee) and who understood themselves to be covered under the CNSGP for such activities, are not financially at a disadvantage as a result of any claim, or potential claim, against them as a consequence of relying on the incorrect information.