Speech from the Chairman of the Medical Academic Staff Committee, Dr Colin Smith 
Tuesday 1 July 2003
This year has been to say the least, challenging. The majority of these issues have been dealt with in the reports of MASC before you but there are a number of areas I would like to pick where key developments are taking or will take place.
These include the Consultant Contract, the Higher Education white paper and the Roberts Report on the Research Assessment Exercise.
The Consultant Contract
For clinical academics the negotiations were never completed and recently the dialogue has re-opened in England, Scotland and Wales.
There has been a great deal of progress with, for once, being good discussions between the Department of Health and Education, the universities and ourselves.
The principles of flexibility, variability and all we do being for the benefit of patients is accepted and a broad agreement has been reached. The devil is in the detail but there continues to be progress and Michael Rees and Iain Robbé are to be congratulated for this.
The White Paper on higher education has many commendable ideas for change and its emphasis on teaching as well as research is to be welcomed. However, the pressures to have solely centres of excellence for research would so undermine the quality of education in an environment of enquiry that medical schools and medical education would be seriously disadvantaged. In addition, there are many units of excellence in universities that overall do not succeed. Are these to be lost because the big five are to gain?
The Roberts report on the RAE while identifying some key areas for positive change has given much the same message of centres of excellence.
There is little or no account taken of translational or community research which is the foundation of development in the care of patients. This research cannot be lost solely to enhance the few.
We have succeeded in taking on extra students and developing new schools but the funding of medical schools is now critical. The universities as a whole are in a financial hole but the changes to research formula (QR) funding has left even the best in difficulty.
We have some of the best educational and research schools in the world - let's not lose them now.
When I began in academic medicine clinical academic practice was in a mess. Poor pay, poor career prospects and increasing workload. We are in danger of going full circle. We cannot let that happen.
This is my last presentation as Chairman of MASC.
I have stood down from re-election after twenty-five years in MASC, nineteen as chairman.
I have worked with many colleagues without whose support MASC could not have succeeded, and in particular I would like to thank Rosemary Weston, Gail Norcliffe, Sally Watson, Martin Woodrow and last but by no means least the current secretary of MASC, Mark Redhead.
To you all I say thank you for your patience and support of MASC.
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