The Government has today published the Health and Social Care Bill outlining a series of changes that will see groups of West Midlands GPs take control of NHS budgets for the region.

The NHS in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are unaffected, but the changes in England are hugely controversial.

If the bill is passed it will be the most radical shake-up of the NHS in England since it was founded more than 60 years ago.

So far a total of nine GP consortia groups have been created in the West Midlands.