NHS Consultants (Hansard, 23 January 2003)

§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord Hunt of Kings Heath)

My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Health is today announcing proposals for a new framework of measures to improve rewards for National Health Service consultants and modernise medical careers in England. Copies of the proposed new framework have been placed in the Printed Paper Office.

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The new framework involves using the extra resources that the Department of Health had previously set aside for implementation of a new consultants' contract (rising to some £250 million by 2005–06) to achieve the continued objective of giving greater rewards to consultants who do most for NHS patients and reforming the way the NHS delivers patient care.

To ensure that this extra investment delivers improvements in NHS consultant capacity, productivity and value for money—and helps reform ways of working—there will be a national framework within which local health services will have a choice of investing in local implementation of the contract negotiated with the British Medical Association in June 2002, where there is a high level of local consultant support; investing in new annual incentives for consultants who make the biggest contribution to improving patient care; and investing extra resources in the new system of clinical excellence awards that is due to be introduced from April 2004.

Within this framework, NHS trusts, primary care trusts and strategic health authorities will be asked to deploy the available resources in ways that most effectively support local priorities for improving the efficiency, quality and responsiveness of patient care.

The new framework will be accompanied by new standards for consultant job planning to help provide more varied and flexible medical careers and a more productive, collaborative approach to planning and reviewing consultants' work for the NHS. There will also be new standards governing the relationship between private practice and NHS work to improve transparency and prevent any potential conflicts of interest. Consultants will need to meet these standards to be eligible for the new incentive payments and to demonstrate that they are meeting the standards expected under the new clinical excellence award scheme.

In line with the objective of supporting medical careers, the department will be introducing on a phased basis a new system of sabbaticals for consultants. Initially, by 2005–06 funding will be made available to enable around 800 consultants each year to have sabbaticals of around two to three months, with coverage extending as workforce capacity expands.

The department will also be working closely with the medical royal colleges to modernise medical training, recruitment and career structures. Reforming medical careers in this way will help deliver in a more effective way the treatment patients need most and enable doctors to develop their skills to the full.