A third group of doctors followed in the footsteps of Tower Hamlets GPs by coming out in opposition to the government’s healthcare bill – just before it passed a vote in Parliament.

GPs from the Oxfordshire clinical commissioning group wrote to all parties about their concerns over NHS reforms, following Tower Hamlets CCG which became the first in the country to call on the government to scrap the bill.

But last night the bill was passed in the House of Commons by 258 to 314 votes.

It faces a final test in the House of Lords on Monday before it can be passed.

Rushanara Ali, MP for Bethnal Green and Bow, who was part of a Labour Party motion calling on the government to drop the bill, said there is still an opportunity for the reforms to be scrapped.

She said: “It’s not just the CCG in Tower Hamlets, it’s now a CCG in Oxfordshire which is only a stone’s throw from David Cameron’s constituency. Up and down the country people are opposing it.

“Sadly we lost the vote but there’s one more opportunity in the House of Lords to stop this bill.”

The bill puts GPS and other clinicians in England in charge of spending the NHS budget, among other changes.

It also encourages greater competition with the private sector.

Tower Hamlets GPs - led by chair of the CCG, Dr Sam Everington – said the reforms would “generate bureaucracy” and “compromise our ability to focus on what really counts” in a letter to David Cameron last month.