The UK General Medical Council has promised to strengthen its procedures for evaluating doctors' fitness to practise and to provide better public access to information about doctors' terms of registration. The move is an attempt to retain responsibility for regulating the medical profession in the United Kingdom and to secure the council's future.

The council was the target of widespread criticism in the hard hitting fifth report of the Shipman Inquiry last December. In April this year, it was forced to suspend the introduction of its new scheme for revalidating doctors (BMJ 2005;330:9, 1 Jan). Graeme Catto, president of the GMC, was optimistic that the proposed new changes would allow revalidation to be launched next spring.

“We need to make registration more meaningful so that we demonstrate that doctors are up to date and fit to practise. We need to make that positive statement that this doctor is fit …