---

General Practice (Northamptonshire)

It is always a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Taylor. I congratulate the hon. Member for Kettering (Mr. Hollobone) on securing this Adjournment debate. The intervention of the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Bone) was obviously important from his constituents' point of view. I have to say, as a Manchester City supporter, that he would be greeted in a positive way if he were to venture into Manchester these days, in view of his well-known likeness to a certain high-profile football manager. Seriously, this is an important debate, and the hon. Member for Kettering raised some valid, legitimate issues on behalf of his constituents. I do not wish to be churlish, but the emphasis and focus of his speech were disingenuous. I shall explain why it is fair to say that. First, the hon. Gentleman said to GPs in his community that he and his party are on their side and that the Government are doing things to the national health service that are getting in the way of their doing their job. That was his main message. He used anecdotes about individuals to prove a point. I always think that it is unfair to try to talk down the NHS by doing that, as 99 per cent. of anecdotes would demonstrate that people receive a wonderful service. I suspect that the hon. Gentleman wrote his speech before the announcement at his party's conference about ripping up the contract that GPs and the Government recently signed. That is now the position of the Conservative party. It has gone down incredibly badly with GPs at a time when the Government's message is that, yes, we need to make significant changes to primary care, but that we intend to do that in partnership with the profession, building on the contract rather than simply ripping it up and starting all over again. The Conservative policy is putting his party into conflict with GPs who are working hard every day of the week to improve the NHS.