Senior Active Doctors

1. Senior Active Doctors Meeting Sunday 4/3/2012 St George Leagues Club, Kogarah

2. The Issue • The current registration category Limited Registration (Public Interest Occasional Practice) (LR-PIOP) is to be abolished in 2013 removing 1800 senior doctors from the register. LR-PIOP was closed for new entrants on 1/7/2010

3. How did we get here? • 2005 – 2010 National registration – architect, Prof Stephen Duckett [ex Alberta, Canada] vehicle COAG/Productivity Commission • Creation of AHPRA, no single jurisdictional accountability (i.e. no accountability) • Medical Board of Australia – ‘supported by (managed by) AHPRA’

4. “Official” NRAS Structure AHMAC AHPRA MBA State Medical Councils Doctor

5. Reality AHPRA AHMAC MBA State Medical Council Doctor

6. Who is AHPRA? • Mr Peter Allen (Public servant) VIC • Prof Con Michael (O & G) WA • Prof Genevieve Gray, (Nursing) QLD • Mr Michael Gorton (Lawyer) VIC • Prof Merrilyn Walton (Social Work) NSW

7. Who are the AHPRA administrators? • Mr Martin Fletcher, Master of Public Sector Management, former UK Public servant • Mr Chris Robinson, Former registered nurse and Director of the NRAIP • Mr John Iiott, Former hospital executive and finance director • Mr Jim O’Dempsey, Former nurse, now AHPRA Business Improvement and Innovation Director • Ms Dominique Saunders, Lawyer & social worker • Ms Ann Morrison, QLD Manager, former nurse • Mr Bob Bradford, ACT Manager, (military logistics) • Mr Richard Mullaly, VIC Manager, former public hospital manager • Ms Lisa Wardlaw-Kelly, TAS Manager, former nurse & health regulator • Ms Robyn Collins, WA Manager, former midwife & nursing professor • Ms Jill Huck, NT Manager, former social worker & public servant • Ms Kay Ascough, NSW Manager, lawyer & former public servant • Ms Diana Newcombe, SA Manager, lawyer & former public servant

8. Who is the Medical Board of Australia? • Dr Joanna Flynn, Chair, GP • Dr Stephen Bradshaw, Vascular surgeon • Dr Mary Cohn, GP • A/Prof Peter Procopis, Paediatric neurologist • Dr Fiona Joske, GP • Dr Charles Kilburn, Paediatrician • Prof Mark McKenna, O & G • Dr Trevor Mudge, O & G • Ms Sophie Panagiotidis, Social work • Prof Belinda Bennett, Lawyer • Ms Prudence Ford, Former public servant, now consultant • Mr Paul Laris, Social work

9. Senior doctors’ position • Offered LR-PIOP until 2013. This category closed 1/7/2010 for new entrants • Doctors not on the general or LR-PIOP register must not practise the profession as defined

10. Motions • This meeting calls on the Medical Board of Australia to re-open the closed registration category called ‘Public interest, Occasional practice’, remove its sunset clause, allow all medical practitioners who have not been able to register in this category the right to do so, and establish this category as a permanent registration classification. • That this meeting endorses the following definition of medical practice. “Medical practice means any role in which medical practitioners use their professional discretion within the limits of their knowledge, skill, and training as medical practitioners for the direct or indirect benefit of patients.”

11. The Economics • As Australia’s population ages, there will be pressure on the health budget • By maximising the contribution of senior doctors through user-friendly registration categories, Australia and Australian will have better and less costly health care.

12. The morality • Our senior doctors have a great capacity to continue to do good for others and must be allowed to do so

13. The Hypocrisy • The argument that our senior doctors cannot be trusted to exercise their privileges with discretion and judgement is without evidence. • It’s a slur on one section of the profession who have shown throughout their professional career, just the opposite. • It’s also at odds with the fact that a doctor at any age can stay on the general register. • It ignores the fact that substantial public safeguards apply to all doctors including those on the occasional practice. • It is an argument developed by bureaucrats to defend de-professionalisation for ideological reasons, namely to remove the medical profession from the apex of healthcare in Australia. Privileges have been extended to other groups who have less training to use them than the senior doctors who are denied them.