The Doctors' Resolve
Any expectation that the representative meeting of the British Medical Association on Wednesday would at all ease relations between the Association and the Government was completely dispelled by the course the meeting took. A good deal of time seems to have been taken-up in replies to unwise passages in some of the Minister of Health's speeches or to what were described as mendacious statements in the Press, and the rather well-worn cliché about "the enslavement of the medical profession" made its inevitable appearance, But no step towards an accommodation was taken, or apparently suggested, a sensible Birmingham resolution proposing an approafh to the Prime Minister, who has already indicated his availability for discussion, being defeated. Actually there was never much likelihood that the representative meeting would do more than confirm and approve the results of the recent plebiscite. But time presses. The operative date for the National Health Service Act is less than four months distant. If there are to be fresh discussions between the Government and the doctors, as there must be, some means of initiating them must be found at once. The doctors undoubtedly have a strong case for amend- ment of certain provisions of the Act, but it is not at all strengthened by the histrionic polemics of certain of their leaders. With the average medical practitioner the crux of the matter is the basic salary and the fear that it may be used to develop a salaried service naked and undisguised. On that the Government may reasonably be called on to modify its attitude, and there is some reason to think that an appeal on this point would not be made in vain. But there is a danger of delay due to the common amour prapre stagnation in which each side sits tight and invites the other to make an advance. Some way out must be found, and found quickly. The best way probably would be for the Prime Minister to invite a few representative doctors to meet him. The public would see in that no derogation to his own dignity nor to the Minister of Health, but simply a reasonable and resolute determina- tion to end a deadlock.
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