NHS appeals to Australian doctors to help solve shortage in UK

THE NHS is to try to recruit doctors from Australia in an attempt to plug a shortage of GPS.

The measure is part of efforts to import 2,000 doctors from overseas in order to prevent practice closures, and a new streamlined process means application times will be cut from a year to three months.

In 2015 the Government pledged to increase GP numbers by 5,000 by 2020. But since then the number of full-time equivalent GPS in the workforce has decreased by more than 1,000. NHS England will target GPS who previously left the UK for Australia and are looking to return home, as well as Australian GPS who want the opportunity to live in the UK.

The international recruitment drive is now being widened to Australia after the NHS received applications from more than 1,200 GPS in Europe.

Dominic Hardy, NHS England director of primary care delivery, said: “It’s no secret the NHS needs to recruit more GPS, so it makes sense to head to Australia where doctors’ skills, training and high levels of care closely match those of their British counterparts.

“The recruitment programme is gathering momentum with interest from GPS in Europe and we also have more home-grown GPS in training than ever before. But why stop there when we know many Australians would welcome the opportunity to work in an English clinical practice.” He said health officials were “pulling out all the stops” to solve the shortage of GPS – including commissioning two UK recruitment agencies to target Australia.

NHS England will offer a relocation package of £18,500 on top of bursaries of around £3,500 a month during their placements, officials said. It will also meet the visa costs of non-eea GPS and help arrange visa sponsorship.

Una Lane, the General Medical Council’s director of registration, added: “As standards in Australia are similar to our own it should be as easy as possible for doctors from there to come to the UK.”