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Junior Doctors Committee annual report 2008

From the chairman

Last year’s recruitment round was a fiasco. Such a major change to the way doctors are selected and trained must be properly planned and implemented with a proper transition from the old to the new, and it will forever be to the government’s discredit that the JDC’s call for delay was not heeded. Sir John Tooke in his welcomed forensic analysis has highlighted this and many of the other problems that occurred last year.

This year the MMC programme board has had strong professional representation. After last year’s problems, junior doctors expressed a strong wish to return to a local recruitment and no limits to their application for posts. There have been problems with the applications this year but importantly, as junior doctors have highlighted these problems to us, we have been able to quickly and effectively deal with them at both a local and national level.

This highlights how effectively the BMA can work by communicating with junior doctors. It is vital that the views of grassroots doctors are being heard. The Regional Junior Doctors Committee can be attended by any junior doctor living or working in the region. It provides an ideal setting to present your views and problems which can then be dealt with locally via our network of EAs and IROs or passed up to UK JDC to be dealt with at a national level. Juniors can also communicate directly to UK JDC with their views by email on info.jdc@bma.org.uk.

At the beginning of the year, I attended a number of the RJDC meetings. This enabled me to hear first-hand the views of juniors around the country but more importantly this was an opportunity for them to directly question how the JDC is moving forward on a number of junior specific issues.

The JDC has been active this year in improving our communications this year to our members. Mass emails and the newly established newsletter have enabled us to keep junior doctors updated with information on the recruitment and selection for specialty training, issues affecting junior doctors nationally such as removals expenses; rota gaps etc and local issues via reports from RJDCs. The BMA have also started producing podcasts to further inform junior doctors of current issues. A number of issues that have occurred this year have highlighted the need for junior doctors to have comprehensive, easy to understand guidance on specific issues that currently affect their working practice, which are available on the website at www.bma.org.uk/

We have also helped askBMA directly by briefing them on specific juniors’ issues so that they can provide better advice to junior doctors. It also gives them an opportunity to highlight specific issues or areas that they are getting significant queries about so that we can more effectively help our members.

We plan to continue to improve our communication with junior doctors and your views on how this is achieved will be very welcome.

EWTD, European Health and Safety legislation will be applicable to Junior Doctors as of August 2009. The impact of the reduction in hours on training is a problem that needs to be addressed. This is most acutely felt in the procedural specialties, especially the surgical disciplines. The JDC is continuing with work to maximise training and working with other appropriate specialty trainee organisation to develop solutions to these problems. Further change to the legislation, including definition of working time, is unlikely to occur at European level and more innovative solutions need to be developed.

The JDC has remained steadfast in its support of doctors currently in the UK on the HSMP and their right to continue to compete equally with UK graduates. We welcomed the win by BAPIO at the Court of Appeal and the DoH guidance regarding IMGs, International Medical Students at UK universities and refugee doctors following the Court of Appeal ruling.

As stated earlier, the final report by Sir John Tooke and his team has been broadly welcomed by the profession. The government response quite rightly acknowledges the important basis of the report but unfortunately provides no clear idea of taking forward two most important recommendations, which are NHS: MEE and the ring fencing of training budgets. We have set up a petition on Facebook which is attracting members and will be sent to the Secretary of State at the end of May to demonstrate the strength of feeling about this issue of fundamental importance. The report from Lord Darzi’s Next Stage Review may perhaps help to clarify the situation as we have been promised but the BMA will continue to lobby hard on this issue.

Download the report as a Word document using the link on the right.

Mr Ram Moorthy
Chairman UK JDC
April 2008