Health Minister and Pakuranga MP Simeon Brown says the deal adds $120.6 million a year, and keeps the cost of a visit the same.
East Auckland’s GP clinics will be paid in a new way from 1 July.
Health New Zealand and GP groups said in a joint statement it will be the first major change to the way general practice is funded in 20 years.
Health Minister Simeon Brown, who is also the MP for Pakuranga, said the deal keeps what patients pay for a visit the same as last year. It changes how clinics are paid, not which clinic a patient can use.
Clinics across the country voted on Health New Zealand’s offer for the year starting in July. Brown announced the result on Friday.
“An overwhelming 86 per cent of GP clinics voted in favour of Health New Zealand’s 2026/27 funding package, which will provide general practice with an additional $120.6 million each year,” Brown said.
Health New Zealand pays each clinic a set amount for every person signed up with it. The health system calls this capitation.
At the moment that amount depends only on how old the patient is and whether they are male or female.
From 1 July it will also go up if a patient has two or more long-term illnesses. It will go up for clinics in poorer areas and those far from a city.
Brown said the old system “no longer reflects the needs of patients”.
The deal will also pay clinics extra if they vaccinate more children, get more people checked for cancer and look after long-term illnesses better.
GenPro, which speaks for clinic owners, said about half of all clinics would clearly gain.
Its chair, Dr Angus Chambers, said about 20 per cent of clinics “may come under greater pressure than usual to increase fees in future years as the transition arrangements wind down”.
GenPro did not say what those arrangements are.
Chambers said the extra money helps clinics stay in business but does not fix how hard it is for some people to see a doctor.
“This package helps improve financial sustainability, but it is not a complete solution to access issues,” Chambers said.
General Practice New Zealand chair Dr Bryan Betty said the money was substantial but the change would hit clinics unevenly.
“Capitation reweighting was long overdue, but changes of this scale inevitably will create differing outcomes across practices,” Betty said. “We do not regard this as a settled issue.”
Two weeks before the vote, Labour health spokesperson Dr Ayesha Verrall said the offer then on the table “fails to lower the cost of seeing a doctor”.
GenPro said the way clinics are paid will be reviewed again in 2028.
