A letter to all junior members, 15 May
From Mmc
Update – Selection to Specialist Recruitment
15 May 2007
This note brings members up-to-date with developments in recruitment to specialist training as at today – 15 May 2007. The situation continues to change constantly and the BMA will continue to email members regularly with the latest position.
The Review of Modernising Medical Careers and legal challenges
The BMA was approached to submit evidence to the High Court as Remedy UK’s judicial review, which is heard this week, cites the Association as an interested party. The MTAS fiasco has caused huge misery to doctors and their families, and we share the concerns of Remedy UK. The BMA warned of the problems that would occur months ago, and it is infinitely regrettable that the government would not listen and ploughed ahead with an untried system that has descended into chaos at every turn.
We believe it would have been easy but fundamentally wrong for the medical profession not to participate in the Review Group. The BMA has a duty to represent its members and we have tried to work towards a solution which sees doctors appointed to the right posts while minimising further anxiety. Doctors need to be in post on 1st August to ensure that their employment and training is protected, and we believe that scrapping the whole system now would only create more chaos and prolong the agony. Improvements are desperately needed but cannot be achieved through action that harms our members. The BMA will continue to support all of its members who have been caught up in this dreadful mess.
Ministerial statement and the end of MTAS
The Department of Health has today (15 May) announced details of how things will progress in a written ministerial statement. Following the completion of interviews for all applicants in the first round, offers will be made locally to successful applicants between 21 May and early June by individual deaneries as interviews for each specialty are completed. By the end of June, this process will be finished, and the second round of applications will begin.
The Department of Health had intended that the electronic system (MTAS, the Medical Training Application Service) would be used to match candidates to posts by ranking the applications that candidates had made. As the BMA has demanded, the Secretary of State has announced that this will be done by deaneries, not by the MTAS system. We welcome the end of MTAS as a selection tool, as it has been shown to be fundamentally flawed, and doctors have no confidence in it.
The essence of the second round of applications is that it will be locally managed by the deaneries rather than centrally coordinated. For the profession to give it any credence, the second round of applications must be seen to be a real opportunity for doctors to be appointed to training posts, and the Secretary of State asserts that “there will be “further substantial opportunities for those who are not successful initially” and that additional training posts will be found. We will be holding the Secretary of State to her promise that this will be the case.
Communication with applicants
It is vital that details of how the next round will work are communicated to applicants and we have raised this repeatedly with those running the selection process, as, to date, information has been sparse and sporadic. In case better communication with applicants does not materialise, the BMA will be continuing to update members with the latest position.
Applicants’ details and security breaches
You’ll also be aware of the breaches of security that allowed applicants’ details to be viewed. The Secretary of State has passed the findings of the security review she instituted to the police, which we welcome, but this does not absolve those running the system of responsibility for allowing such a thing to happen in the first place.
Future action
We are acting on the deeply held concerns of the profession and believe that being part of the solution is the only responsible way forward. We cannot abandon our trainees to an uncertain fate decided by employers. We have a duty to do what we can to ensure that they are placed in appropriate training posts as quickly as possible. We have successfully argued for a fully independent inquiry to address these matters urgently. This inquiry, which is being led by Professor Sir John Tooke, will also address how this mess was allowed to happen and make recommendations on how the process can be improved so that this never happens again. It is vital that the profession takes a constructive lead to ensure that developments for future years are professionally led, for the benefit of patients and doctors.
