Politics before patients

Without a doubt, the NHS has a doctor recruitment problem. Depending on your point of view, it can be described as anything from a shortage to a crisis. In Gateshead we have had to close at least one GP surgery because it was impossible to recruit a new GP after one left a practice which was already suffering from being one GP short. Our hospitals suffer from similar doctor shortages. Traditionally, we have recruited from abroad to fill the gaps. Sky News today reported that it is now increasingly difficult to recruit doctors from outside the EU because of the points based visa system the UK operates. The system is in place because of political reasons. Governments need to be seen to be cracking down on immigration but ministers tell us that highly skilled workers are welcome here. And then they create a system that makes it nearly impossible to bring to the UK those same skilled workers. We are told that the points based system is to protect British skilled workers, but if those same British skilled workers don't exist, what's the point of keeping out the skilled workers from outside the EU?

Given that the same or a similar system is expected to be applied to EU workers after Brexit, we are heading for a far greater crisis than the one we have now. Perhaps the Brexiteers will argue that we can recruit new doctors from the ranks of the British unemployed but it takes years to train them to the necessary standards. It seems the NHS has fallen victim to political posturing. Politics before patients.