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On the 19th March, the Prime Minister announced an extra £100 million to stimulate the development of local incentive schemes that support the delivery of NHS Plan targets and local Health Improvement Plans and promote new ideas.

What is the aim of the incentives scheme?

From April 2001, at least £100 million is available for Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) and Primary Care Groups (PCGs) to work directly with general practices and primary care professionals to promote new ideas and to continue to improve patient services. The intention are to incentivise and invest in local initiatives that lead to real sustainable improvements in service delivery.

Are there any guidelines as to what the money should be spent on?

The NHS Plan has set out a number of priorities for Primary care. It is for PCT/PCGs and practices to develop the local Incentives schemes within this broad strategic context. There are a number of key priorities where development of practice and community based teams could make a significant contribution to further improving delivery of services to patients. PCT/Gs will therefore wish to seek agreement with practices to invest in, for example, taking forward implementation of the National Service Framework standards such as - CHD - construction of disease registers, increased Statin, Ace Inhibitor, Beta Blocker and Aspirin prescribing.

The DH has also issued guidance on the incentives.

How do I ensure that I exercise appropriate stewardship over public monies in the course of managing Investing in Primary Care monies?

It would be advisable to have a separate record detailing both plans for and actual expenditure relating to the Investing in Primary Care monies.

Have the first tranche of monies reached practices yet, as promised?

We are confident that in the majority of cases local schemes have been developed and resources given to front line professionals according to the time frame indicated. The detail of schemes has taken longer to develop in some places, particularly where there has been local debate on the scope of the investments to be developed. We have emphasised the need for local agreement between practices and the PCT on the scope of the inveestments to be developed

How will we know that this money has actually reached GPs?

There is no single mechanism to identify whether each GP has actually received the resources earmarked for investment under this scheme. The guidance details the variety of ways in which resources can find their way to the front line in this context, either via adjustments to local PMS contract, via local development schemes or under HSC 96/31 schemes, all methods of developing and supporting innovation at a local level.

There is a line in the quarterly FIS (Financial Information Systems) return from Health Authorities which identifies HA spend on PCG/T incentive schemes, but this incorporates established prescribing incentive schemes within its number so will be a large figure than the resources applied through Investing in Primary Care.

Are these monies recurrent?

The monies are available to practices in two trances; £50 million was made available upon publication of the guidance, with PCT/Gs required to have agreed the detail of their local schemes and distributed resources to practices by 30th June 2001. An average practice receives £5,000. Another £50 million (tranche 2) will be made available at the beginning of April 2002. These monies are to reward practices that have achieved the targets that they have agreed locally with their PCG/T. Tranche one monies are recurrent, tranche 2 monies are non-recurrent.