The Health Minister has said the Government is doing all it can to support GPs amid a "crisis" where doctors say they are at breaking point.
On Monday the collective GenPro launched a campaign called 'save your family doctor' to get the Government to support GPs. They say understaffing has led to long wait times. They say they are feeling overrun and are fearful for patient safety.
They wrote an open letter to Government calling for better funding and more acknowledgement.
When speaking to Breakfast this morning, Health Minister Andrew Little said the Government is doing everything possible to address the issue, but it won't be fixed overnight.
"We do have a GP shortage; there's no question about that, so a number of measures are being enacted to address that, some of them short-term, the immigration issues are short-term.
"We're making it easier to get doctors who are qualified from overseas to come here and to practice here - then there's the long-term stuff which is creating more of our own," Little said.
Little said he wants to see far more medical school graduates go into GP training, from 200 to 300 a year. He also wants to lift trainee doctors' pay and provide more support for practices that supply training.
"Part of the challenge is that a lot of medical graduates get into hospital, they quite like the rhythm and pattern of that and fewer have been going into GP practice," he said.
Little said the issues have been long-standing.
"These problems haven't happened overnight; this has been many years in the making - we're doing things now that should've been done 15 or 20 years ago, but we have to do them now, but we won't fix the shortage overnight," he said.
The minister also responded to claims that the Government isn't acknowledging the needs of GPs - saying that he has been meeting with a wide range of groups to understand the situation.
"The whole time I've been minister, there have been a number of issues we've been addressing, including increasing the number of medical graduates who go on to become GPs.
"In fact, I met with GenPro probably less than two weeks ago and talked about their very issues," he said.
Pay parity for GP nurses compared to their hospital counterparts was another issue that Little addressed - he said he has been working on the issue and will have an announcement soon.
Wait times for hospitals have skyrocketed recently, especially in rural communities. Some patients say they heve had to wait weeks before booking an appointment.
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