Doctor In The Trough

The National Audit Office's report on GP pay perfectly encapsulates Labour's problem with spending: more GPs, lower productivity, and some spectacular troughing by GP partners:

In 2005-06 the annual average pay of a GP partner was £113,614, an increase of 58 per cent since 2002-03. GPs report, however, that over the last year their pay has stayed the same or decreased. GP partners have taken more profit from the practice as pay while the average salary for GPs they employ increased by only three per cent in the first two years.

And the new contract has cost the government £1.8 billion more than was predicted. Still, that wouldn't even buy you an Olympic stadium these days. Westmonster remembers when that money would buy you two or three decent wars.