Lessons from Albion: Can Australia learn from England’s approach to primary healthcare funding?

Abstract

As Australia struggles to meet increased demand for healthcare and contain expenditure there has been a focus on primary care and its role in demand management and keeping people out of expensive secondary care. However, with domestic policy struggling to find a suitable approach consideration of English policy could well be fruitful in our quest to strengthen and develop primary care in Australia. Whilst there are differences in the structure and organisation of funding and service provision between countries, there are developments in England that are worthy of a second look – these include a focus on funding and commissioning that rewards quality not just activity and volume. As Australia sees the development of new primary care organisations that are tasked with commissioning then developments and lessons around the technical and relational aspects will be important to consider. This paper considers policy developments in England and explores these in relation to the Australian healthcare.