The Health in Hackney Scrutiny Commission met to discuss access to local GP services, a review of primary care commissioning, and the Healthwatch Hackney annual report. The members were also scheduled to discuss and agree on a work programme for the coming year.

Local GP Services: Access and Quality

The Health in Hackney Scrutiny Commission were scheduled to receive an update on the access and quality of local GP services.

Those attending for this item included:

• Dr Zara Georgiou-Park, GP Partner Lower Clapton General Practice, City and Hackney Primary Care Clinical Lead, City and Hackney Neighbourhoods Clinical Lead, Hackney Marshes PCN Clinical Lead
• Dr Kirsten Brown, GP Partner at Spring Hill Practice and The Lawson Practice and Clinical Director for City and Hackney Place Based Partnership, NHS NEL
• Leillia Shaikh, Deputy Director of Primary Care Delivery, NHS NEL
• Helen Goodrum, Head of Primary Care Delivery for City & Hackney, NHS NEL
• Caroline Millar, Chair, City and Hackney Integrated Primary Care
• Dr Nick Brewer, GP Partner Lower Clapton GP Practice, Interim Chief Medical Officer, City and Hackney Integrated Primary Care
• Sally Beaven, Executive Director, Healthwatch Hackney

The report pack included a presentation from the Primary Care Clinical Lead for City and Hackney, Healthwatch Hackney's GP patient experience dashboard 2023-24, and Healthwatch Hackney's GP patient experience report 2023-24.

The presentation from Dr Zara Georgiou-Park included results from the 2024 GP Patient Survey (GPPS). According to the survey, 4,048 people completed the survey in City and Hackney, with a response rate of 15%, which is lower than the rates for North East London (NEL), London, and England. The results showed that City and Hackney performed better than NEL, London, and England in most measures of experience, though there were variations within City and Hackney.

The presentation also included information on the Primary Care Transformation Portfolio, which aims to provide consistent, high-quality primary care, enabled by a dedicated and multi-skilled workforce. The portfolio is driven by five strategic goals: empowering patients, improving access, working smarter, modernising primary care, and building the workforce.

The report pack also included GP Patient Survey results by GP practice, including:

• How easy or difficult it is to contact a GP practice on the phone, via the website, and via the NHS App
• How helpful patients find the reception and administrative team
• How often patients get to see or speak to their preferred healthcare professional
• Whether patients knew what the next step would be after contacting their GP practice
• Overall experience of contacting the GP practice
• How patients feel about the length of time they waited for their appointment
• Whether patients' needs were met at their last appointment
• Overall experience of the GP practice

The report pack also included Healthwatch Hackney's Community Insight Dashboard, and The Experience of GP Services, a trends analysis report by Healthwatch Hackney.

The Healthwatch Hackney report was based on the experience of 2,241 people. Feedback was obtained from a variety of sources, including engagement, surveys, and comments posted online (NHS, Care Opinion and social media). According to the report, the vast majority of people receive good quality, compassionate treatment and care, with good levels of support and involvement. Patients would like greater levels of service access and communication. Overall sentiment is 80% positive, 19% negative and 1% neutral.

Local Enhanced Services in Primary Care: Commissioning Review

The Health in Hackney Scrutiny Commission were scheduled to receive an update from NHS NEL on the North East London-wide review of local enhanced service contracts in primary care.

Those attending for this item included:

• Leillia Shaikh, Deputy Director of Primary Care Delivery, NHS NEL
• Helen Goodrum, Head of Primary Care Delivery for City & Hackney, NEL NHS NEL
• Dr Zara Georgiou-Park, GP Partner Lower Clapton General Practice, City and Hackney Primary Care Clinical Lead, City and Hackney Neighbourhoods Clinical Lead, Hackney Marshes PCN Clinical Lead
• Dr Kirsten Brown, GP Partner at Spring Hill Practice and The Lawson Practice and Clinical Director for City and Hackney Place Based Partnership, NHS NEL
• Caroline Millar, Chair, City and Hackney Integrated Primary Care
• Dr Nick Brewer, GP Partner Lower Clapton GP Practice, Interim Chief Medical Officer, City and Hackney Integrated Primary Care
• Sally Beaven, Executive Director, Healthwatch Hackney

The report pack included a briefing from NHS NEL.

According to the briefing, there are a variety of services commissioned from primary care in North East London that are classed as a local enhanced service (LES). These are typically services that are not part of core General Practice, and are commissioned either from General Practice, Primary Care Networks, or GP federations. The enhanced service review programme has been established to review the services commissioned from primary care across North East London, understand the gaps, identify any ongoing need for services, and agree a consistent commissioning framework that meets current procurement guidelines.

The aim of the review is to identify efficiencies and improve the quality of delivery across North East London, with a consistent approach to commissioning in line with procurement guidelines. The objectives include ensuring robust programme reporting and decision-making governance, identifying schemes that have no added value or duplicate existing services, prioritising and replicating schemes that improve outcomes or support shifts of care, reducing avoidable admissions and unwanted variation, identifying any gaps in commissioning of services, reviewing contracting models, contributing to the development and implementation of the Long Term Condition (LTC) framework, improving productivity and efficiency, and reducing unwarranted variation in the delivery of enhanced services.

Healthwatch Hackney Annual Report 2024/25

The Health in Hackney Scrutiny Commission were scheduled to consider the annual report of Healthwatch Hackney, which is submitted to Healthwatch England¹. Those attending for this item included:

• Deborah Cohen, Chair of Healthwatch Hackney
• Sally Beaven, Executive Director of Healthwatch Hackney

The annual report included:

• A message from the chair
• A message from the executive director
• Information about Healthwatch Hackney, including its vision and mission
• Information about how Healthwatch Hackney reaches out to the community
• Information about the views of residents on health and care
• Information about engagement and co-production
• Information about the Learning Disabilities Quality Checkers project
• Information about the Father Friendly Borough project
• Information about the City and Hackney Neighbourhoods Programme
• Information about Healthwatch investigatory reports
• Information about the System Influencers programme
• Information about the People's Feedback Panel
• Information about information and signposting
• Information about Info Exchange Meetings
• Information about the Healthwatch Hackney board, volunteers, and staff
• Financial information

According to the report, in 2024-2025, 3,716 people shared 16,022 issues on health and social care services with Healthwatch Hackney, which helped to improve care. Healthwatch Hackney published 8 Enter and View reports about individual GP surgeries and mental health wards at East London Foundation Trust, and the final GP Registration Review Report. 21 volunteers and interns gave 2,051 hours to help improve care in the borough.

HiH Work Programme and Response to Scrutiny Public Engagement

The Health in Hackney Scrutiny Commission were scheduled to agree on a work programme for the municipal year and note the responses to the Scrutiny annual public engagement.

The report pack included:

• Work Programme for 2025-2026
• Themed list of suggestions for Health in Hackney received so far
• Final report on the Scrutiny Annual Public Engagement 2025

The Work Programme for 2025-2026 included items such as:

• Adult Social Care - new CQC full inspection and briefing on Self Assessment exercise
• Homerton Healthcare Quality Account 24-25 - HiH response
• St Joseph's Hospice Quality Account 24-25 - HiH response
• Substance Use Support in LBH
• Review of Enhanced Services in Primary Care across NEL
• Local GP Services Access and Quality - outcome of the improvement plans for GP Access
• Healthwatch Hackney Annual Report 24/25
• City & Hackney Safeguarding Adults Board Annual Report 24/25
• Adult Social Care Transformation Programme 4th update
• Care Charging Policy - update on public consultation
• Future options for Soft Facility Services at Homerton Healthcare
• Future of Leadenhall Sexual Health Clinic - verbal update
• Integrated Neighbourhood Teams (INTs) next steps
• Changes to the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework - local implications in Hackney
• NHS 10 Year Plan's and how changes to ICB will impact on Hackney PBS
• Patient Data Sharing/ the NHS Federated Data Platform
• Transforming the Frality Model and what it means for patients
• Adult social care - CQC inspection report action plan
• Adult social care - Business Critical Dashboards relevant to ASC
• Updated Community Mental Health service offer
• Cabinet Member Question Time: Councillor Christopher Kennedy
• City and Hackney Place Based System - annual update
• Measles outbreak and system response
• City and Hackney Integrated Primary Care 2 yrs on
• Disabled Facilities Grant (update on waiting times with dashboard on how the service has been improved)
• Healthy Weight JSNA - update on how outcomes are monitored, how implementation is proceeding and on any relevant KPIs
• Adult Social Care Transformation Programme 5th update
• Possible site visit - Surgical robotics - new surgical theatrea at the HomertonHometon Healthcare
• NHS Dentistry provision - update on new commissioning arrangement
• Cannibis use and legislation - Combating Drugs Partnership response to Mayor Of London's LDC report

The Themed List of Suggestions for Health in Hackney included suggestions such as:

• Adult social care - CQC inspection report
• Adult social care - out of borough placements
• Adult social care - older people's services
• Community Mental Health offer
• Changes to the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework - local implications in Hackney
• Frailty model
• Homerton Hospital complaint handling
• ICBs changes to role
• Integrated Neighbourhood Teams
• Integrated Primary Care
• Measles outbreak and system response
• Surgical robotics

The Final OS Engagement Report-2025 included the results of a public survey that ran from 16 May 2025 to 13 June 2025. 73 people responded to the survey. The survey asked residents about the issues or concerns which they think scrutiny should consider. The suggestions were summarised in the report.