The Department of Health’s handling of the problems with the Modernising Medical Careers (MMC) programme last year was “inept,” and the leadership it showed was “totally inadequate,” according to a report published by the House of Commons’ Health Select Committee.

The damning report from a cross party group of MPs comes days after a House of Lords judgment that ruled that the Department of Health had acted illegally in restricting the right of medical graduates from outside the European Economic Area (EEA) to work as doctors in the United Kingdom (BMJ 2008;336:1037; doi: 10.1136/bmj.39574.363924.DB).

The select committee questions the role of the chief medical officer (CMO) in a situation in which junior doctors struggled with a poorly tested computer based application system and faced unprecedented uncertainty about their career.

“The management of the introduction of the MMC reforms . . .was inept,” says the report. “Project management . . . was equally poor.”

Decisions took little account of the needs and concerns of …