Can you imagine a job advert that doesn’t tell you where you will be working, the hours of work, what you will be paid, when you need to start or the length of the employment? Furthermore, when you call up to ask these questions your prospective employer refuses to give you an answer…
Well many of us don’t have to imagine, we just have to be junior doctors. Everybody from office temps to fruit pickers has the basic right to this information but, it seems, not junior doctors.
In 2008, the BMA challenged the Employment Agency Standards Inspectorate (EASI), the organisation responsible for regulating employment agencies, to find out whether deaneries were employment agencies in the eyes of the law. If they were, deaneries would have to comply with the requirements of the Employment Agencies Act and supply all the basic details about their jobs before they start.
Much to our satisfaction EASI confirmed that postgraduate medical deaneries appear to be employment agencies and as such would be required to comply with the requirements of the Employment Agencies Act. The BMA immediately began notifying EASI of deaneries failure to comply with the legislation.
Sadly, the costs of getting deaneries to provide junior doctors with the same basic rights as other workers caused the government machine to whirr into action and in
In May 2009, the Department of Business and Skills (BIS) published a consultation which detailed their intention to exempt deaneries from the employment agency regulations.
The BMA responded strongly to this consultation stating that deaneries should not be exempted. If BIS chooses to ignore the views of junior doctors and exempt deaneries then we must start the hard work of getting deaneries to sign up to a code of practice that raises standards.
Junior doctors are united on this issue and the JDC will do everything in its power to get what are basic employment rights for junior doctors. Should we not be satisfied with the terms of the code of practice for UK junior doctors, we will not be able to agree to them.
Our aim is to ensure that junior doctors are merely afforded the same rights to any other work seeker - no less. We will have a better idea of the direction of the code of practice early next year, so watch this space.
In the meantime, do get in touch with the deaneries and the BMA if you have trouble with applications for specialty training.
