§ Sir E. Graham-Littleasked the Home Secretary why he has refused permission to undertake private practice to a refugee Austrian doctor of medicine of the University of Vienna, allowed to enter this country in 1938, who has taken a British qualification and been admitted to the register, although he allowed this doctor, in October, 1941, to accept a part-time appointment to a private school in the town where he wishes to practise; and whether, in view of the fact that the population of this town has increased from over 50,000 to over 100,000 since the outbreak of war and that a number of doctors formerly practising there have been called up for service and have not been replaced, he will reconsider this decision?
§ Mr. H. MorrisonIn giving effect to the policy of allowing a few specially selected foreign doctors to engage in private practice in this country, appropriate measures are taken to safeguard the interests of British medical practitioners, particularly of practitioners who are absent on military service or who are engaged in the Emergency Medical Services. With this abject in mind, I did not feel justified in agreeing to the Austrian doctor's proposal to establish himself in private practice close to a practice in which he had recently been employed as an assistant; but I am prepared to give sympathetic consideration to any application which he may make for permission to establish himself elsewhere.