Dedworth 
I’m happy to be a retired, non-golf playing consultant, uninvited to this discussion between Ded and Joebloggs, and now GwaPito!
Thankfully my parents, both GPs, lived and worked in an era when home visits and night calls were very much part of their work ; patients were mostly grateful ; and no-one, to my knowledge, complained about their hard-earned salaries.
Just for the record, of the roughly quarter of a million UK doctors registered with the GMC ( General Medical Council ) , around a quarter of those ( 62,000 ) are on the GP Register. Slightly more than half of GPs are male. There are roughly 670,000 nurses and midwifes registered with the NMC ( Nursing & Midwifery Council ). That’s the largest group of staff employed by the NHS, and about 11 times the number of GPs. One person in 18 is now employed by the NHS.
Staff costs account for around two-thirds of spending on health services, and total UK expenditure on healthcare in 2011 was £ 143 billion.
Maths is not my best subject, and I’ve said before how vital other healthcare professionals have been in my work, but a 24/7 health service with equitable pay for all employees does have resource implications.
Re-negotiating their contracts and including provision by GPs of out-of-hours care would be easier to implement than cutting their salaries ! I’m all for increasing nurses’ salaries, and could add laboratory scientists, medical secretaries, healthcare assistants and physiotherapists ( among others ) to that list. I also respect those whose work is unrelated to the NHS, but that's off-topic.
Originally Posted by Doc Alan
