The way most practices work is that GP partners would delegate compliance to practice managers and not take an active role in compliance matters. The system would run on an element of trust, so if the manager says everything is fine, this is taken at face value.

The difference with CQC is that this time round your licence to trade is now dependent on meeting the regulatory standards and the partners are required to have a good handle on their level of compliance. GP Partners need to know they are compliant and ignorance of the law is no excuse.

As a partner you need to have a better understanding of operational issues and how everything works, or at least have good systems that make you aware of alerts and what outcomes are being achieved.

The BMA guidelines suggest that:-
" ..... we believe that for most providers it will be appropriate for a partner to be the registered manager, although in some cases you may decide that it is more appropriate for a practice manager to take this role. The registered manager role should certainly not be viewed simply as an administrative management role, due to the legal responsibilities involved."

In their FAQs, the CQC say
"In most partnerships, we would expect one of the partners to be the registered manager."

As a reminder, for CQC, a Registered Manager is the person registered with the CQC to be in day-to-day management of one or more regulated activities. The registered manager takes on special responsibilities and has a legal role in enabling and monitoring compliance with essential standards across your regulated activities.

If the partner takes on the role of a registered manager, they need to be much more hands on with compliance. If the day to day management is delegated to the practice manager, which it invariably will be, they need to have a good reporting system that allows them to be a full time physician as well as be able to manager compliance.