HC Deb 15 July 1975 vol 895 c467W
Mr. Donald Stewart

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services how many foreign doctors have entered the United Kingdom to practise in each of the last five years.

Dr. Owen

Information in the from requested is not available. Table 1 gives

Hospital Doctors RHB Administrative Medical Staff
Year Number Whole-time equivalent General Practitioner*
1949 (31st December) Not available† 11,735 61 17,651
1973 (30th September) 29,668 27,401 152 21,615
1974 (30th September) 30,515 28,408 No comparable figure 21,824
* Principals contracted to provide general medical services.
† Statistics for 1949 related to numbers of appointments and did not eliminate duplication Numbers of doctors cannot, therefore, be given in a form comparable with recent statistics.
‡ The hospital figures exclude clinical assistants. A number of clinical assistants are also general practitioners and hence are counted in the last column. In 1973 there were 6,498 clinical assistants of whom 4,436 were also general practitioners.