Media release

AMA welcomes Mason Review recommendations

AMA NATIONAL CONFERENCE 2013 (Twitter: #amanatcon)

AMA TO WORK WITH GOVERNMENT ON MASON REVIEW RECOMMENDATIONS

The AMA welcomes the release of the final report of the independent review into the Government’s health workforce programs.

Health Minister Tanya Plibersek released details of the Mason Review of Australian Government Health Workforce Programs at the AMA National Conference in Sydney this afternoon.

AMA President, Dr Steve Hambleton, said the AMA will look closely at the key recommendations of the review and looks forward to working with the Government to improve health workforce programs, especially those that affect rural communities.

“The Government has commendably already moved to adopt two key recommendations,” Dr Hambleton said.

“The decision to overhaul the discredited ASGC-RA classification system, which is currently used to underpin a range of Commonwealth health workforce programs, is long overdue.

“It is not meeting the needs of rural and regional areas and suffers from a range of anomalies.

“The AMA will work with the Government to ensure that any changes better target rural workforce incentives and deliver better outcomes for patients in rural and regional communities.

“The AMA also welcomes the commitment to a new rural training pathway for medical graduates.

“This has the potential to improve recruitment and retention in rural areas as well as expand critical medical training opportunities as graduate numbers grow and our traditional settings, such as public hospitals, struggle to meet the demand for training places.

“The AMA played a leadership role in this review, making an extensive submission and meeting on several occasions with the review panel,” Dr Hambleton said.


24 May 2013

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