Doubletalk

Lord Clement-Jones asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether their commitments on medical training are compatible with cuts in
teaching staff at medical schools.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord Hunt
of Kings Heath): My Lords, the additional costs of teaching the increased
number of medical students were fully taken into account at the last
spending review. The Department of Health and the Higher Education Funding
Council are monitoring implementation of medical school expansion and will
assess whether shortages of clinical academic staff are an issue.
Lord Clement-Jones: My Lords, I note the Minister's reply, but I hope that
in monitoring the situation the Government will recognise that the current
situation is extremely dire. Redundancies have taken place or are planned at
a host of medical colleges including Bart's, Imperial College, King's,
Leicester, Leeds and Newcastle. There are 300 unfilled academic posts in our
medical schools, yet we anticipate a 63 per cent increase in medical
students up to 2005. The Minister will undoubtedly be aware that this is in
large part due to the vagaries of the research assessment exercise, which is
grossly underfunded and operates against academic medicine. When will the
Government get their act together and have genuinely joined-up government
with the Higher Education Funding Council?
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: My Lords, the noble Lord has made a number of
comments. However, on the core question of universities' ability to handle
the increase in medical school places, which is critical to implementation
of the NHS Plan, I remind him that medical schools bid for extra places on
the basis of their statement that they can recruit the required number of
staff to teach the medical students admitted to their schools.