17 MAY 1946, Page 2

The Doctor's Pay

The report of the Spens Committee on the remuneration of general practitioners fully bears out predictions of the liberal treatment that would be recommended. The Committee was asked to consider what the total professional income of a general practitioner in a publicly organised medical service ought to be, in the light both of existing earnings and of the emoluments calculated to maintain the status of the profession and to attract to it suitable recruits. In ascertaining the average existing incomes the Committee has per- formed valuable service, and there will be general agreement with its verdict that existing standards, under which over 4o per cent, of urban general practitioners between the ages of 4o and 55 have a net income (i.e., when necessary professional expenses have been deducted) of under £1,00c a year and close on' 20 per cent. of them less than ,C700 a year, are too low. The proposals are detailed, for they deal with percentages and age groups, but what they amount to,

broadly speaking, is that roughly three-quarters of the G.P.s between 4o and 5o years of age ought to achieve a net income from all sources of over kr,000 a year and roughly half of them to get over L1,300. There seems nothing unreasonable here, though a comparison with other professions may be provoked—as, for example, between the rewards of the cure of bodies and those of the cure of souls. But the Spens Committee figures are, in fact, very different from what they seem. They have expressed everything in terms of 1939 values, leaving it to the Minister and the statisticians to determine what the incomes would need to be at present prices. That is no im- possible task. The cost-of-living index is available, and application of it shows that L1,300 in 1939 is worth at least L1,800, and probably more, today. That is a very substantial figure, and Mr. Bevan will have to consider seriously whether it is a reasonable one. Some regard should be had to the general run of professional incomes over a wide field. In the light of that it may well be felt that some- thing short of the Spens figure would still leave the doctors well provided for.