Family doctors will be invited to petition the Government today as the Conservative Party tries to gather support against plans to build a new generation of NHS polyclinics across the country.

In an interview with The Times, the party’s leader, David Cameron, sets out his objection to the clinics, also known as “super-surgeries”, which he sees as “another example of the Government’s mistaken, top-down reform to the NHS”.

Ministers claim that polyclinics, placing family doctors alongside other services such as diagnostic testing, minor surgery, physiotherapy, pharmacy or dentistry, will offer patients more convenience and choice.

But Mr Cameron condemned the plans, announcing the start of a week-long offensive against the Government’s health policy.

As many as 1,700 local surgeries in England would have to close or merge in order to form the clinics, he said.

“The NHS has suffered hugely from fads driven from Whitehall. And my worry, and why we’re launching this campaign, is that this is the latest fad. The Government has already tried to bring about the end of the district general hospital. Now ministers are trying to abolish the family doctor service.

“Communities which have lost their Post Office, their local shops and their local police station, are now going to lose their doctor.”

In a speech to the King’s Fund, the charitable foundation, in London this morning, he will urge doctors to sign-up to an online manifesto which declares general practice to be “the foundation of the NHS”.

The petition adds: “We want to be free from central Government interference and bureaucracy; able to control our own budgets; rewarded for working in socio-economically deprived areas; free to reinvest for our patients’ benefit and able to innovate in contracts with healthcare providers.

It continues: “We also believe we should be free to determine the opening hours, size and locations of our practices, in response to our patients’ needs, and object to being forced into polyclinics against our will.”

The British Medical Association has also criticised the Government’s “headlong rush” to replace GPs’ surgeries with polyclinics, which they fear will result in the “commercialisation of patient care” as private firms bid to run such centres.

A total of 150 centres are already planned for London. Other parts of the country are expected to follow suit when Lord Darzi of Denham, the Health Minister, publishes his review of NHS services in June.

The petition, and another for patients who object to the potential closure of local surgeries, will be hosted online by the centre-right think-tank 2020health (www.2020health. org) from this morning.

Lord Darzi, a leading surgeon, has recently claimed that he has been misunderstood over his plans for polyclinics.

He told The Times earlier this month: “The idea that I am going to herd all GPs into one large building is ludicrous. There are very good examples of federated models where you have five or six practices that have access to a diagnostic service.”

A report published last week by the NHS Confederation admitted that there had been some confusion about the Government’s plans and gave warning against “knee-jerk reactions” to new health centres.

Alan Johnson, the Health Secretary, said last night: “Gimmicks and petitions are no substitute for tackling the real issues in primary care.

“We are opening 150 new GP-run health centres, open from 8am to 8pm, 7 days a week. And because this programme is all paid for with new money, none of it will lead to a reduction in traditional GP services.”

Michael Taylor, chairman of the Family Doctor Association, described the text of the Conservative petition as “anodyne”, but said that many GPs would not find much to disagree with.

“The petition reflects and will harness the GPs current dissatisfaction and discomfort with the Government’s NHS reform.

“Most GPs will recognise this petition as politics rather than policy; nonetheless I believe many will relish the opportunity to give the Government a bloody nose.”

Times Recommends

• Charles blazes trail as sun king
• Thalidomiders win payout 50 years on
• Libel gag on talk of 'medical hurricane'