WELSH GPs are preparing for industrial action after 99 per cent voted to reject the government’s 2024-25 contract offer, British Medical Association (BMA) Cymru Wales announced today. 

GPs and GP registrars from across the country took part in the union’s online referendum on the General Medical Services contract offered by the Welsh government last month.

The poll, which ran from November 25 to December 16, saw 99 per cent vote to reject the contract, on a turnout of 68 per cent.

BMA’s Welsh GP committee chairman Dr Gareth Oelmann said: “The profession has delivered a clear message with this result.

“We simply cannot keep services going and meet the needs of our patients with less money and fewer resources. 

“If we accept the offer as it is, more practices will undoubtedly close, leaving patients in greater peril, that’s why GPs from across Wales have taken a stand.”

He said Wales’s GP service has been starved of adequate funding, with 100 surgeries closing since 2012 and a recent survey finding 91 per cent of its GP members are routinely unable to meet patient demand due to “neither safe nor sustainable” workloads.  

A Welsh government spokesperson said: “We acknowledge the strength of feeling following the BMA Cymru Wales referendum and are committed to continuing to work with the profession to secure a sustainable future for general practice. 

“Our offer met the independent pay review body recommendation for a 6 per cent increase to GP pay and would have also seen that uplift applied to pay for all members of the practice team.

“This offer was made within a very constrained budget environment, which has required very difficult choices to be made.”