THE newly elected chair of the British Medical Association’s Northern Ireland Council, Dr Alan Stout, has called for “bravery” in protecting an “extremely uncertain” health service.
As the most senior BMA committee in Northern Ireland, Dr Stout will work to represent all doctors in the health service.
The east Belfast GP is taking over from Dr Tom Black, who used his final speech in the role to warn of a brain drain of Northern Ireland doctors to the Republic where a much higher rate of pay is offered.
Dr Stout has spent the last six years as chair of the Northern Ireland GPs Committee and was also an expert panel member for the Bengoa review, which set out a roadmap to reform Northern Ireland’s health service in 2016.
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Dr Stout said he was “honoured” to be taking up his new role at a time when doctors in GP surgeries and hospitals were struggling to deliver care in a system “reeling from years of political absenteeism, underfunding, declining workforce numbers and the worst waiting lists in the UK.”
With years of below inflationary and delayed pay rises, he was unsurprised that junior doctors and others were locked in pay disputes with the government.
Stating that the obstacles were not “unsurmountable,” he said the unity of the pandemic response showed that “brave, decision making” to protect the health service and patients could be taken quickly.
“I believe we need that sort of bravery now from our political leaders and the Department of Health with regards resolving doctors’ pay disputes and improving terms and conditions, urgent health service transformation, harnessing new technologies to ease staff workloads and streamlined multidisciplinary working between primary and secondary care,” he said.
“As chair of Northern Ireland Council, I will work hard to ensure doctors voices are heard every step of the way.”
