Tony Abbott and Colin Barnett announce plans to build a new medical school in Midland, north-east of Perth. Photograph: Sarah Motherwell/AAP
The federal government has ignited a new battle with the Australian Medical Association (AMA) after announcing the opening of a new medical school in Western Australia, which the head of the association has labelled “calamitous” for those involved.
The new medical school will be operated through Curtin University and will have 60 undergraduate positions by 2017, rising to 110 positions by 2022. The federal government will put in $20m a year in the first years of operation, with the state and university covering all the capital funding for the school.
The federal electorate of Hasluck, where the new facility will be based, is held by the Liberal party’s Ken Wyatt with a margin of just 0.6%.
“This is a dream that has been nurtured and nourished by doctors in Western Australia for a long time because we all know that Western Australia has a significant doctor shortage,” the prime minister, Tony Abbott, said when making the announcement on Sunday, alongside the WA premier, Colin Barnett. “WA needs more local doctors.”
“The case is very strong. On a per capita basis we are 900 to 1,000 doctors short in Western Australia compared with the country as a whole,” Barnett said.
But president of the AMA, Brian Owler, said the announcement was a “calamitous” captain’s call by Abbott that will do little to fix the shortfall in doctors.
He argued the country simply cannot sustain more medical students because of the shortage of internships and training places for graduates.
“This announcement will cause chaos in the medical training pipeline,” Owler said. “I think it will be calamitous for the people involved.”
The head of the Australian Medical Students’ Association, James Lawler, said the announcement of the new school showed a “a serious lack of workforce planning” and “appears to be driven by politics rather than public health”.
“Opening up more medical schools without increasing clinical training sites is a short-sighted move, and will create more problems than it solves.”
Abbott acknowledged the lack of training places was an issue, but said the expansion of the Midlands hospital in Perth would go some way towards addressing the problem.
“They’re [the AMA] absolutely right to be concerned about the subsequent clinical training places, and what we’ve done is work with the West Australian government to get a guarantee from the West Australian government that the clinical training places will be provided,” the prime minister said.
“I’m confident that long before these additional students will be coming into the system as graduates, we will have a much stronger clinical training system in place here in the west.”
The guarantee is not enough to satisfy Owler, who labelled the new school a thought-bubble of people “with a superficial understanding of health issues” who are more interested in shoring up political support than creating good health policy.
“A new school flies in the face of all evidence that is available,” Owler said. “It is not going to fix the shortfall [of doctors in WA].”
The treasurer, Joe Hockey, slammed the AMA’s comments on ABC TV on Sunday morning.
“I think Brian Owler’s language was extreme and certainly not fitting for someone representing a great profession. Quite frankly, I think his comments were out of order,” he said. “I think the broader medical profession would not take the view of Brian Owler.”
The shadow treasurer, Chris Bowen, said that was “an extraordinary personal attack” on the AMA president, who is one of Australia’s “most distinguished surgeons”.
“It’s clear that Joe Hockey can’t accept criticism and has a glass jaw,” Bowen said.
The AMA waged fierce and ultimately successful campaigns against the government’s proposed GP co-payment, and the subsequent proposal to cut rebates for short consultations.