It didn't take the BMA too long to hop on the bandwagon, here is their statement that endorses the decision to abandon MTAS. Given that the BMA was opposed to the Remedy march, this really is pretty rich. The job of union should be to lead in order to further the interests of their members, not to follow others claiming credit for acts that they had nothing to do with.
"However, the BMA is opposed to the proposal from some pressure groups that interviews which have already taken place should be written off. This move was rejected at the recent BMA conference of junior doctors."
This statement is also somewhat debatable, as a motion was passed at a recent BMA conference that stated the only option was to cancel all interviews and revert to the old process, or interview all candidates for all their choices. The current bodge was therefore rejected by the BMA, this directly contradicts this BMA statement. This is not the only example of Dr Rowland getting more than a little confused, he is quoted on the BBC site as saying:
"'However, Dr Rowland said the BMA remained opposed to the Remedy UK legal challenge, saying that scrapping the first round of applications would be disastrous for doctors, for patients, and for the NHS'."
However he is reported to have said on stage at a recent JDC conference that the BMA was not opposed to the Remedy legal challenge. Does Dr Rowland has a bit of memory problem or is he deliberately changing his tune? Either way it just goes to show you can't trust the BMA heirarchy as far as you could thrown them. This kind of behaviour is at best stupid and thoughtless, at worst it is dishonest and cynical.
Let us remember that the BMA were part of the review group and did not walk out of this in the end. The BMA have also been complicit in the creation of MMC and MTAS, and now they have shown once again that they cannot be trusted.
5 comments:
The two allies; the DoH and the BMA must've sought legal advice on the validity of the judical review and possible outcomes, hence the DoH must've had something to dooo with the BMA's statement of not supporting Remedy UK and the bit about 'scrapping the first round of applications would be disastrous for doctors, for patients, and for the NHS'
The BMA is self serving and is by no means representative of doctors. I wonder how many job interviews and offers will Jo Hellhole and her Raw ..ing partner will end up with.
Regardless of the outcome of the legal case, doctors should stop financing the BMA ... En mass! The traitors! :-(
Good luck Remedy UK
Everyone should stop subscriptions to the BMA now, it is your money that funds their treachery. I post as anonymous because I can't master the technology
Sue
As a member of the BMA I have to correct you on a point of fact, the BMA did not oppose the marches that occured in London and Glasgow. In actual fact the BMA supplied a significant number of the marshals for both events.
Whilst the BMA has not always been as responsive as it could have been with regards to the MTAS debarcle, it has, as far as I am aware, worked very very hard to acheive the best possible outcome for doctors entering speciality training.
As a profession we should stand united as infighting within the profession is simply seized upon by the media and used by the government to ignore our concerns.
The BMA has a crucial role in representating doctors interests. I do not feel that the interests of the BMA's members would have been best served by the BMA walking away from the review group. If the BMA had walk out in the initial stages of the process, the government would have simply gone ahead with MTAS without any input from the medical profession.
Actually several leading BMA members spoke out against the marches, it was only a last minute decision to change their tac. Hence the BMA did actaully oppose the marches at a certain point. They may have changed ad no optiontheir tune and jumped on the bandwagon once they realised what a success they would be, but it was too little too late.
The BMA should have walked out of the review panel, as the panel was completely DoH dependent. It was always clear the review panel was a mere token gesture, hence the BMA had no choice but withdraw, they took the choice of betraying their members instead.
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