My Lords, following the disruption of medical education that followed on from the MTAS debacle in 2007, one of the outcomes, which was a positive one, was the development of schools of surgery—a concept that we took on from the anaesthetists. This required personnel from the Royal College of Surgeons and the deaneries to take responsibility for the delivery and planning of training and education. However, this was very much confined to trainees. There was no requirement to extend it to consultants in terms of CPD.
However, we all know that health education does not end with certification; it is a continuum that occurs throughout one’s career as a professional doctor. It is a requirement to keep up to date. It is a requirement by the GMC to ensure that one knows what is happening within the wider medical field. One of the problems for doctors is having the time to go away and attend courses to improve one’s CPD. The amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Patel, places an obligation on HEE and the LETBs to support CPD and, in doing so, to allow the release of NHS staff, as he quite rightly said, to attend courses and educational programmes. It is also important to provide consultants and medical personnel of all disciplines with the opportunity to work in the wider NHS. It has been one of the basic tenets of the NHS that contributions in the wider NHS benefit not only the NHS but the participants, who learn a lot more about its workings. That, too, can improve and enhance one’s continuing development.
In that context, I welcome the suggestion made today several times by speakers—certainly by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, in that he made reference to the Francis report. One thing that came out of the Francis report was a clear statement that he would recommend that the GMC and the royal colleges
work together in providing visits to educational centres. That was stopped some time ago. I think that there is a real opportunity to reintroduce that and I hope that the Minister, in responding, will address that issue. Here again is an opportunity, because in the past lessons were learnt by consultants visiting hospitals and looking at the education provision.
The very presence of peer groups in a hospital often helps to raise standards. Therefore, not only would CPD provide another training opportunity for those who participate but it would improve local education provision. The quality assurance of the training it would provide would ensure that, in the long term, patients benefited from such visits. For that, if nothing else, I support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Patel. We need to include something on continuing professional development because the whole emphasis of HEE is very much on training and trainees and it has very little to do with those who continue right through to retirement.