GMC spunks £43,000 of OUR money on junket to South Africa

Thanks to the wonders of the Freedom of Information Act, the inner working of the GMC are open to scrutiny. The GMC is funded by an annual levy paid by DOCTORS, and not the tax payer. My annual fee went up by £100 this year to £390. Without paying this, I am unable to practice medicine.

Someone on Doctors.net noticed the following statement in the GMC council minutes:

"Council members and senior GMC staff attended and participated in the 8th Conference of the International association of medical regulatory authorities in Cape Town."

To which the intrepid doctor asked (under the freedom of information act), and then thankfully to freely share then information freely:

a) please enumerate by name the people from the GMC (council members and senior staff) who attended (and participated) on behalf of the GMC

b) please tell me how much this junket cost the GMC in total

c) please give the amounts of expenses that that the various GMC attendees and participants claimed for this junket. Comment - please attend to the recent decisions of the Info Commissioner on MPs expenses whilst you are deciding whether to and how to answer this information inquiry. It is clearly in the public interest that subscribers whose money is running the GMC know how it is being spent. I am sure transparency in financial matters is foremost in the GMC press office's mind.

Here's the reply:

Thank you for your email below regarding attendance at the IAMRA conference in Cape Town in October 2008. In response I have adopted the lettering system used in your request:

a) The presenters and attendees were:
Presenters: Dr John Jenkins Finlay Scott
Attendees: Dr Edwin Borman Paul Buckley Professor Sir Graeme Catto Claire Herbert Dr Joan Martin Jane O’Brien Paul Philip Dr Nicola Toynton

b) The total cost to the GMC was £43062.96. c) The expenses claimed by each individual were as follows:
Dr Edwin Borman = £44.00
Paul Buckley = £56.43
Professor Sir Graeme Catto = £40.64
Claire Herbert = £18.00
Dr John Jenkins = £91.52
Dr Joan Martin = £97.18
Jane O’Brien = £0.00
Paul Philip = £0.00
Finlay Scott = £44.20
Dr Nicola Toynton = £329.48 (Any connecting air fares were paid for centrally, hence they are included at b) above. Any connecting rail fares were claimed individually, hence Dr Toynton’s expenses figure being in excess of the others)

If you have any queries concerning this request please do not hesitate to contact me.

Forty three grand?? For what benefit? Did that number of people have to go? Did 10 Quangonauts, at [a 'credit-crunch busting' -Ed] £4300 each, really have to go??

Presumably, they managed to pick up a few tips on red tape from the French Conseil Generale and Kangaroo court procedures from the Australian GMC, from which we will all doubtlessly benefit.

At a time, when doctors are under attack for merely interacting with pharmaceutical companies, and a simple biro is seen as a corrupt inducement, should we be paying for our unaccountable, unelected Gaulieters to Swan off to Cape Town for a bit of sun- at OUR expense?

[Ed - before the usual Daily-Mail reading suspects make the usual ignorant, smart-arse comments below: Of course, what with GPs earning £250k per year for doing less work and playing golf whilst Baby P dies and immigrants are stealing your jobs, they should have taken twice as many people and gone first class.]