Delegates defied their family doctors' advice and called on GPs to give up their independence to become salaried NHS employees.

Applause greeted the results of a vote which showed 79 per cent believed all doctors should be salaried. Only 17 per cent disagreed.

But British Medical Association chair Dr Ian Bogle stoutly defended GPs' independence. 'The best way to care for the people I care for is as an independent contractor.

'Just because consultants are salaried doesn't mean we would give a better service if we were,' he said.

Professor George Alberti, president of the Royal College of Physicians of England, disagreed: 'The integration of medicine as a whole service would be much better if we were all salaried,' he argued.