Senior doctors support calls for swift resolution

Media release

Senior doctors support calls for swift resolution of negotiations

The country’s senior doctors support Medical Council Chair’s call for a swift resolution of their negotiations with DHBs.

Medical Council Chair John Campbell has told Radio New Zealand that there is a serious shortage of senior doctors particularly in some specialties and in particular in the smaller DHBS.

He said it was a very serious situation which is having an adverse effect on the ability of our system to provide care.

Association of Salaried Medical Specialists executive director, Ian Powell, says senior doctors agree with Professor Campbell’s view that the situation should not be allowed to drag on.

“We support one hundred percent his comments that the negotiations should be brought to a resolution as soon as possible because the longer they drag on he more uncertainty there is in system.”

Ian Powell says that is exactly what senior doctors want to see too.

“We have been negotiating for a year and got nowhere which is why senior doctors are taking the unprecedented action of calling nationwide stopwork meetings.

“We are calling on the DHBs to resume negotiations in good faith – not to threaten to walk away from our scheduled talks or deliberately confuse the situation with a call for pseudo arbitration.”

Ian Powell says there are major problems about recruitment and retention of senior doctors in our public hospital system and DHBs need to acknowledge that they have to be competitive to maintain effective services.

ENDS

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