General Practice Pay Transparency: GDPR information

Pay transparency in general practice was introduced into the GP Contract Regulations in October 2021. The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) subsequently confirmed that the implementation of general practice pay transparency was to be delayed.  The data collection has now been resumed beginning with 2021/22 NHS earnings.

On 1 October 2022, amendments to the NHS (General Medical Services Contracts) Regulations 2015 (the ‘GMS Regulations’) and the NHS (Personal Medical Services Agreements) Regulations 2015 (the ‘PMS Regulations’) came into effect to require certain other individuals, namely ‘job holders’, to self-declare their NHS earnings if these are above the earnings threshold for the relevant financial year. These changes are also reflected in an amendment to The Alternative Provider Medical Services (APMS) Directions 2022. GMS, PMS and APMS contracts have been varied to incorporate these amendments.

The following individuals will be required to make a self-declaration on an annual basis if their NHS earnings exceed the threshold for the relevant year:

• individuals who hold the GP contract as partners (including partners who are not GPs) and contractors who are individual medical practitioners
• partners of clinical sub-contractors and sub-contractors who are an individual (including partners of any onward clinical sub-contractors and any onward clinical sub-contractor who is an individual)
• individuals who work for (are engaged by) either a contractor (regardless of whether the contractor is an individual medical practitioner, a partnership or a limited company) or clinical sub-contractor (including any onward clinical sub-contractors) under either:
  • a contract of employment
  • a contract for services
  • or as a company officer (directors and any company secretary).
• Individuals engaged by a third party to provide clinical services (for example a locum engaged via an employment agency)

The thresholds of NHS earnings for the financial years 2021-22 to 2023-24 above which a self-declaration must be made are set out below:

• 2021-22 - £156,000
• 2022-23 - £159,000
• 2023-24 - £163,000.

Individuals who are in scope are required to confirm their name and job title and to declare the following information:

•  their NHS earnings for the relevant year
•  the organisation(s) from which the NHS earnings were drawn.

Data collected as part of the General Practice pay transparency collection for 2021/22 NHS earnings may be published by NHS England by virtue of s260(1), taking account of s260(2) and s260(3) of the Health and Social Care Act 2012.

See the data release register for more details.

• Be informed
  
• Get access to it
  
• Rectify or change it
  
• Erase or remove it
  
• Restrict or stop processing it
  
• Move, copy or transfer it
  
• Object to it being processed or used
  
• Know if a decision was made by a computer rather than a person
  

Consent is not the basis for processing

UK GDPR Article 6(1)(c) Legal Obligation (Establishment of Information Systems for NHS services: General Practice Contract Data Collections Directions 2017).