Should postgraduate training places be reserved for UK graduates?

YES

For decades the United Kingdom has recruited overseas doctors to supplement its workforce. In more recent times, the number of doctors needed has increased as a result of an ageing population, labour intensive new technologies, and shortening of working hours. Recognising these factors, the UK greatly increased medical student places. In a few years there will be many thousands of additional medical graduates annually, and for the first time the UK will be able to meet its medical workforce needs largely through its own graduates. This large increase in medical student numbers creates an increased need for foundation programme places for new graduates and eventually for training places in the specialties if new graduates are to be effectively employed in the workforce.

Most medical disciplines require many years of postgraduate training for full certification, and graduation from medical school is at about the halfway point of a young doctor's training path. Little can be done with a medical degree without completion of both the requirements for GMC registration and a period of post-registration training leading to full registration as a family doctor or specialist. Medical student training times are longer than for most other university courses, requiring five or six years of undergraduate training or a basic degree followed by a four year graduate entry course. Young people invest a great deal of time and hard work in completing their primary degree. The financial costs to the individual and to society are considerable.

Some other professional degrees—notably a law degree—provide useful skills for work outside the primary discipline, but this is less so with medicine, where the integrated …