More UK doctors want to work in Australia as they face poor pay conditions and want a better deal

Thousands of UK doctors have set their sights on a new life in Australia, but it might not be the “Nirvana” they are expecting.

A recent survey by the BMA found that junior doctors are cutting back on buying food and heating their homes to help make ends meet.

Australia would welcome fed-up junior British doctors looking to escape poor pay and working conditions in the crippled UK National Health Service (NHS).

But Australian Medical Association president Steve Robson said any influx of new doctors would depend on more national funding for an already pressured system.

His comments follow a poll by the British Medical Association (BMA) that revealed a third of more than 4500 junior doctors surveyed across England said they were planning to leave the country in the next year – and Australia was the top destination of choice.

AMA president Professor Steve Robson. Supplied

And while Professor Robson said the transition from working in the UK to Australia was “very easy to navigate” given the similarities between Medicare and the NHS, he warned Australia’s healthcare system was not in the best shape either.

“It’s an easy transition – we already know that there’s a lot of traffic of doctors between the UK and Australia,” Professor Robson said.

“It’s certainly an attractive proposition. There are some issues around visas and getting their qualifications recognised in Australia and so on but they’re pretty straightforward.

“But I think the doctors also need to know that it’s not exactly in Nirvana here either. There’s a huge class action going on in the country for wage theft of junior doctors here and we’re seeing enormous pressures on nurses, doctors, people in the Australian health system.

“Things are not exactly in Nirvana here, but they are probably better overall than the UK.”

A recent survey by the BMA found that junior doctors are cutting back on buying food and heating their homes to help make ends meet.

The BMA poll found four in 10 junior doctors would be leaving the National Health Service (NHS) as soon as they could find another job.

More than eight in 10 said that the decline in real-term pay was fuelling their decision to leave the NHS, while others cited deteriorating working conditions.

Of those planning to leave the UK altogether, Australia was the top destination, with 42 per cent of the cohort polled identifying it as their destination of choice.

New Zealand (20 per cent), the Middle East, Canada and Europe, excluding the UK, (each 9 per cent) were also popular.

The damning results came as the union vowed to press ahead with a ballot for strike action on January 18.

Co-chair of the BMA junior doctors committee Dr Vivek Trivedi said the “figures are hugely concerning”.

“If our government doesn’t act now, it doesn’t take a genius to see where this will lead: an exodus of junior doctors to foreign countries, with the ones who stay in the NHS facing an ever-increasing workload – until they feel they have no option but to leave too or get burnt out,” he said.

“If the government wants ‘move to Australia’ to stay off the New Year’s resolution lists of junior doctors, it is going to have to start by reversing the 26 per cent real terms pay cut they have endured since 2008 – or at the very least start speaking with us and stop ignoring our repeated calls to address our pay.”

In a New Year address to BMA members, chairman of the council Professor Philip Banfield, said the country’s health service would not be able to cope with a brain drain.

“We won’t stand by while our country gets sicker, we will not tolerate the chaos that we contend with every day at work or acquiesce to those looking to slash pay and drive down living standards,” Professor Banfield said.

“For decades the NHS was the envy of the world. We haven’t given up on that. We haven’t given up on the future where patients can expect the very best care where they don’t need to worry about whether an ambulance will show up or if they will be left vulnerable in a hospital corridor.”

The BMA said that junior doctors had faced some of the steepest cuts to their pay of any public sector worker over the last fifteen years, with their pay falling by more than a quarter in real terms since 2008/09.

A recent survey by the BMA found that junior doctors are cutting back on buying food and heating their homes to help make ends meet.

The BMA is calling for increases of 26 per cent and the union has said it is likely doctors will strike unless pay demands are met.

Originally published as More UK doctors want to work in Australia as they face poor pay conditions and want a better deal