§ SIR JOHN GRAYsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Has ''The General Council of Medical Education and Registration," appointed under the Act 21 & 22 Vict., c. 90, "represented" to the Privy Council, with a view to obtaining the co-operation of that body in improving the mode of educating and examining candidates for medical and surgical degrees, that the Official Reports forwarded to the Council for their information in the years 1865, 1866, 1867, and 1868, by the heads of the Military and Naval Medical Departments, complain of the "ignorance" of a large proportion of the licensed Surgeons and Physicians who annually present themselves as candidates for medical employment in the Army and Navy; and that the tabular Returns recorded in the Minutes of the Medical Council show that within the period embraced in the Reports named more than one hundred and fifty licensed Surgeons and Physicians who were entitled to hold any Poor Law or other Civil medical appointment in the Empire were rejected by the Military and Naval Medical Boards as persons to 1270 whom it would be dangerous to entrust the lives of Her Majesty's Forces because of their "ignorance" of the profession of which they are "licensed practitioners." If the Medical Council did not "represent" to the Privy Council that seventeen various kinds of medical and surgical diplomas or degrees were included in the list of those held by the one hundred and fifty candidates rejected for their ignorance of the elements of professional knowledge, did they represent to the Privy Council the case of any one of the licensing bodies who issued their degrees or diplomas with a view to put an end to the granting of licenses to practice, which the Reports and Tables recorded in the Minutes of the Council prove to be delusive as guarantees of practical medical knowledge; and, if the answers to the above questions shall be in the negative, to ask, is the Government prepared to take means to secure to the general public the same or similarly effective guarantees against the licensing of ignorant and incompetent men which are now enjoyed by the Military Forces of Her Majesty?
MR. BRUCESir, no such representations have been made by the Medical Council to the Privy Council either with respect to the medical men, rejected upon examination by the Military and Naval Medical Boards, or with respect to the granting of licenses to the 150 rejected candidates; but I have reason to know that the fact has come under the notice of the Medical Council and excited their serious attention. I am informed that the Privy Council is at the present time in communication with the Medical Council, with a view to considering whether the Medical Act may be so amended as to insure a higher efficiency in the medical profession of the United Kingdom.
§ SIR JOHN GRAYsaid, the right hon. Gentleman had not answered his second Question.