Jeremy Hunt, the Health Secretary, has today announced that newly qualified Doctors will be forced to work for the NHS under the new contract for the first 4 years of their career.
Many Junior Doctors, disheartened by the imposition of the new contract, have up-rooted their families and moved abroad in search of better life and safer working conditions.
But in Jeremy Hunt’s latest move these Doctors are to be fined if they leave the NHS during the first four years of their career.
These controversial plans mean that Junior Doctors will be forcibly tied to the new contract and therefore creating a monopoly on Junior Doctors. The legality of this move is yet to be determined.
This move has been taken in a bid to ensure we have “home-grown” Doctors and rely less on the “foreign” workforce we already have. Recent studied have demonstrated that more than 30% of the NHS workforce were not raised in the UK.
Sceptics warn that the NHS is at risk if we alienate hard-working Doctors and Nurses who have move here from abroad.
Current Doctors warn that ongoing concerns raised around the new contract mean that many people will be hesitant to train as Doctors in the future. This year was the first that many universities opened medical training to clearing – a clear warning of what the future might hold.
Dr Mark Porter, the BMA’s council chair, said: “The Government must tackle the root causes of this workforce crisis and the reasons why so many UK-trained doctors are considering leaving the NHS, rather than forcing doctors to stay in the health service.
“Demotivated, burnt-out doctors who don’t want to be in their jobs will not be good for patients.”
