NHS Expert, Dr Jack Saunders is a research fellow on the Cultural History of the NHS project in the History Department at the University of Warwick. He comments on the news that the number of medical school places will increase by 25% from 2018 under plans to make England "self-sufficient" in training doctors with the expansion in training places from 6,000 to 7,500 a year,

• "Complaints of shortages of doctors (and nurses, domestic staff etc.) are as old as the NHS itself. Historically the Ministry of Health has struggled with planning staffing."
• "Hunt is not the first Minister of Health to declare an intention to replace "imported labour" with domestically trained doctors. It was the intention of virtually all governments from the 1960s. They usually fail to recruit enough medical students or retain enough staff."
• "Doctors are an internationalised workforce and trying to control who practices where has never worked in the past."

Dr Jack Saunders is available for interview or further comment on Skype, Globelynx camera or ISDN line.

You can read more about the Cultural History of the NHS research project here: Cultural History of the NHS

You can get involved with the People's History of the NHS project here: People's History of the NHS

Contact:

Alex Buxton: Media Relations Manager, University of Warwick

Tel: 02476 150423
Mob: 07876 218166
E: a.buxton.1@warwick.ac.uk