KEY POINTS:
Medical students say they do not want strict bonding, but loan write-offs would be a good place to start in encouraging new graduates to stay in New Zealand.
National leader John Key says his party is considering wiping medical students' loans if they agree to work as GPs in rural areas for three or four years.
The idea of bonding was touched on in the party's 50-page policy discussion document on health, issued last year.
That document will be the basis of the party's health policy, although the policy is still being developed.
But Mr Key said yesterday he was concerned about the number of young graduates completing their qualification and then leaving the country.
"We can't afford to be Australia's education facility," he said. "We're educating young people, they're hugely skilled, we want them in our economy."
He said National was looking at creative ways to keep them.
"There are plenty of doctors who have a student loan - they might owe $100,000. The concept of them working in part of regional or rural New Zealand for three or four years to have their loan written off might be very attractive," he said.
Any scheme would be voluntary.
NZ Medical Students' Association president Anna Dare said loan write-offs would be a good short-term solution for slowing the exodus of new doctors overseas.
"Debt relief offered at the time of entry into the medical workforce and in return for a service commitment to New Zealand is something the NZMSA has been advocating," she said.
But, she said, doctor shortages were not confined to rural and regional areas, or to general practice.
"We have moved beyond a simple maldistribution of our medical workforce and now face a national doctor shortage."
Lower medical fees and increased central Government funding of the health system would be required alongside immediate debt relief, she said.
Health Minister David Cunliffe said voluntary bonding was one of a range of ideas the Government was considering as part of its workforce development plan.
He said that as part of that policy, training places for doctors had increased twice under the present Government to 365.
That meant this year there was the highest number of first year medical students.
In November, an extra 40 young doctors would graduate and a further 40 new students were starting as medical students this year.
The Government had also increased the number of places on general practice vocational training from 69 to 104 in the 2008 academic year.
Increasing numbers of fifth-year medical students were working in rural locations in areas such as Southland and West Coast through an immersion programme.
Auckland University Students Association president David Do said a 2005 survey found only 20 per cent of medical students received an allowance for the six years of their study.
Two thirds of respondents in the study had also stated they would consider leaving New Zealand within three years of graduating.
The level of debt affected the professions medical graduates entered. Financially less-rewarding areas such as general practice and rural practice tended to miss out.
AUSA wanted the National Party to commit to increasing access to student allowances by scrapping parental means testing, he said.
- NZPA
