Representatives from our 27 LMCs and those across the UK met on Thursday 24 and Friday 25 May in Newport, Wales. The full agenda for the day and which motions were passed can be read here, with the two motions listed below being proposed by LMCs from London.
Normally the recordings of of each day area added to the archive section of the BMA’s live streaming page some time after the event.
Kensington, Chelsea and Westminster LMC
That conference deplores the current ambulance wait times, offers allyship to paramedics who are working with insufficient staffing levels, and calls for:
- acknowledgement that longer ambulance wait times change the risk: benefit ratio for patients and GPs when deciding to wait for ambulance conveyance compared to transferring using their own or public transport
- access to real-time information for patients and GPs for ambulance conveyance so that patients can make an informed decision on whether to transfer to hospital independently
- ambulance services to advise patients and GPs regarding, and take clinical and legal responsibility for determining, the safest mode of conveyance.
This motion was proposed by Dr Lisa Harrod-Rothwell, parts 1 and 2 were carried, part 3 was not.
Written by the Agenda Committee and proposed by Lambeth LMC
That conference has significant concerns about visible reduction in the representation of GPs within the BMA over the last two years, including changes to procedures for electing representatives to the 2024 BMA Annual Representative Meeting, and:
- believes that with the exception of the General Practitioner Committees (GPCs), the BMA no longer adequately represents all GPs
- calls upon the GPC UK to consider GP relevant motions passed at ARM, but not to enact them unless they are consistent with UK LMC conference policy
- requires the GPCs to analyse the evolving political movements in other branches of practice so that they may be better understood, learned from and that GPs can be appropriately
protected from any conflicts of interest - calls on GPC UK to explore options regarding improving and safeguarding GP representation within the BMA, to prevent decisions about general practice being made by a body in which
GPs are a minority - requires GPC UK, GPDF and NIGPDF to explore and, if viable, enact and fund GP trade union representation independent of the BMA, whilst retaining close links with secondary care
colleagues.
This motion was proposed by Dr Gerard McHale, with the first four parts carried and the final part not.