This was reported on CBC last night and makes interesting and essential reading:

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-col...obstacles.html

Hi

1. A couple of comments, if he was married to a Canadian, why did he wait a year to submit the application.
2. Secondly his comment about residency positions should be open to the "best". Why should my taxes fund medical schools and why should Canadian residents pay high tuition fees, when at the end of their studies to be told, "well there is no residency position for you as we have filled all the spaces with off shore candidates who we felt were better than you".

I am with PMM, why did he wait so long if he was married to a Canadian? Why did he wait until the possible 6 months it can take to get Spousal PR could screw up his application for a residency. Obviously we all hope for the miraculous 2 week-2 month turnover but it's practical to plan for the worst.

From what I read it seems as though he hasn't done a residency anywhere as he's going back to England to do his residency there.

Different situation, then. Headline is misleading to use the term "doctor" when the more correct term is "medical graduate."

You are a doctor when you graduate medical school. A good friend of mine just graduated from med school in England as is currently delighting in doing his residency rounds and being called 'doctor'.
The article seems poorly researched, I'm not sure what the sentence, 'one year requirement' refers to. He could have applied for pr immediately after his wedding so why didn't he? Thats the question I would be asking if I were the journalist.

I suggest the better question to be asked is: Why are there insufficient residency places available when Canada is screaming out for doctors? That way, Canada wouldn`t have to operate protectionist measures to ensure home grown physicians are able to compete.

I agree though, the subject of the article does appear to be a dick

Hi

Actually there are lots of Doctors, the shortage is in family practise. Everyone wants to be a specialist, regular hours, better money.

All noted

the canadian authorities view internationally trained individuals with suspicion, I know of uk & european specialists who have had to essentially redo specialist training to be able to practice in Canada, in some provinces fully trained uk/european dentists need to spend 2 year at university before they can practice.

residency places are in short supply, possibly as a consequence of the ill advised policy of a few years ago when medical school places were drastically cut. I know of a canadian educated doc who was unable to get a licence to practice in ontario for no obvious reason other than they were not allocating any new licences, he had to take a job in the US whilst continually reapplying to get a canadian licence - it took several years.

I am also aware of potential medical students who have gone to Australia to complete their medical degree because the competition locally is high.

I suspect there is also the lack reciprocity too. I don't think the UK medical council or authority, or whatever it is, recognizes Canadian trained doctors as fully equivalent as UK ones either (though I understand this is being worked on), so there is equally some hoop-jumping to be completed by them coming into the UK - or so I believe. I'm sounding a bit woolly 'cos I'm half remembering many conversations with a British GP friend who works here now - and all the things she had to do to finally work.

Once the UK fully recognizes the Canadian-trained docs, perhaps there will be some speed to the processes for UK docs working in Canada (she says without much conviction)?

Many countries will think their own home-trained docs will be superior to foreign-trained docs. And because there is such a wide gulf in standards and education across the globe, they lump all the foreign trained docs together. Canada does it. Maybe the UK does it.

We Brits obviously think our home-trained docs are pretty damned good too, and are somewhat put out when others refuse to believe it too

Perhaps put another way - the UK should not recognise Canadian qualifications unless reciprocal treatment is given.

A lazy approach ... Australia (and NZ) does make a distinction between training in some countries which is deemed broadly equivalent to Australia and elsewhere.

The real problem in the UK right now is that the EU-commissioners demand that doctors from European countries be permitted to practice in Britain despite some serious shortcomings in language and medical skills.

Mmmm

I've seen the NHS advertise jobs in spanish newspapers. I think that was for nurses rather than doctors though...

of course one of the canadian problems is that historically there has been some difference between educational standards of different provinces, this is supposed to be harmonised now, but there are tensions under the skin here too