NHS England wants to reduce the opening hours of and cut funding to the Barkantine & St Andrews practises in Tower Hamlets. The Barkantine surgery is the closest practise to Canary Wharf one of the UK's most important business districts and already has 18,500 patients. The St Andrews practise in Bromley-by-Bow is also affected.

Government policy is to promote 8am to 8pm 7 day opening hours for patients to access GP services. The Barkantine Practice & St Andrews have been providing these opening hours for our patients for the last five years, and our patients tell us they really appreciate these extended hours as so many of them work long hours.

However, as part of their changes to services, NHS England wants to cut your GP’s opening hours down to 8am to 6.30pm Monday to Friday and 9am-1pm Saturday morning despite the area having one of the fastest growing populations in the country.

They also want to cut funding to the Barkantine & St Andrews by up to 40%, meaning that there will be real cuts to the services we can provide and this will threaten the viability of the practice.

Please ask NHS England to stick to their original 10 year contract and not to try and make changes while the area is undergoing a population boom.