BMJ  2005;330:252 (29 January), doi:10.1136/bmj.330.7485.252

Letter

The GMC: expediency before principle

BMA chairman responds

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR—The BMJ's rigorously exercised editorial independence is well shown, but lest Editor's choice and Smith's editorial on the General Medical Council are mistaken for BMA policy, I emphasise that these were not the BMA's views in the wake of the fifth report of the Shipman inquiry.^{1 2}

Richard Smith, a long-term critic of the GMC, says that Dame Janet Smith finds deficiencies in the GMC's new fitness to practise procedures introduced in November 2004. Would it not be sensible to allow the new system a chance to prove itself before condemning its existence? In chapter 27 of her latest report Dame Janet says that broadly speaking the changes are an improvement, stating: "I do not know how well they will operate in the interests of patient protection." She believes it would be sensible to allow the new procedures "to develop and settle down before their adequacy and fitness . . . [Full text of this article]

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BMA House, London WC1H 9JP jjohnson@bma.org.uk

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