Warren Entsch (Leichhardt, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I welcome the opportunity for governance of this area to come under the jurisdiction of the federal parliament as of 1 July, because I think what we need to do here is send a strong message out to the Australian medical colleges that, with the gift of monopoly—which is what they have—come serious obligations in relation to the way in which they treat foreign trained doctors. Regional Australia could not function without the services of these foreign doctors. Let me tell you, Madam Deputy Speaker, that these colleges are nothing but old boys clubs. They have been established by those who get major benefits from the current situation. They do not like any competition whatsoever. If another doctor comes in and does not play the game, they will attack them relentlessly and they will remove their opportunity or their licence to practise.

I have such a situation in Cairns. Dr Roger Chatoor was recruited from the United Kingdom. He was recognised as one of the best cardiologists in the United Kingdom. He came over here, recruited to an area where there has never been an intervention cardiologist. He came over with glowing reports from those that recruited him of over 9,000 successful procedures. In Cairns, over a period of 12 months, he did 1,600 procedures. In those 1,600 procedures, he had operated in 500, and of those 500 there were 230 that could not be done in our region before he came. The mistake he made was that he was successful and he was not prepared to play the game.

There are four senior cardiologists in Cairns who have been involved in, first of all, collusion and, secondly, dishonest conduct. They are not interested in the wellbeing of Cairns or the far northern region. They are acting only in their own self-interest in relation to their income. Because Dr Chatoor was not prepared to play the game, they have been ringing around nursing staff and other cohorts in other hospitals. They have been involved in influencing the chair of the assessment committee at the royal college to make sure that this fine cardiologist is kicked out of the country. It is absolutely appalling.

I have over 5½ thousand signatures from people in support of Dr Chatoor. But what has happened now is that, because those cardiologists have influenced this decision, through deception and collusion, Dr Chatoor’s 457 visa is now under threat of being rescinded. He is a man of impeccable qualifications. For the last four or five months, he has been fighting this, and the community has been fighting to keep him. What they have argued all the way through is that this is a peer review issue. But understand that his supervisor, who had given him above-average assessments all the way through, subsequently relocated 500 metres down the road and, because Roger did not go with him, he had a whinge and suggested that there was a supervision issue.

For months now, we have been trying to deal with that. They changed the rules that allowed him to practise. They came back and said, ‘Well, if you get into the public health system, we’ll allow you to stay.’ He was happy to do that. Unfortunately, Queensland Health said: ‘No, we don’t have any space for somebody like Dr Chatoor. We don’t need another cardiologist in Far North Queensland.’ In the meantime, the hospital cardiologist has been filling in at the private practice where Roger was working—and they are asking him for an opinion.

It is absolutely appalling, and I call on the Australian Medical Council to start setting accreditation standards and to give 12 months for these colleges to start to sort out their nonsense, to sort out this mafia that they are involved in and to improve conditions, transparency and accountability. I also believe it is about time that we had a full Senate inquiry to investigate this. I have absolutely no doubt that we need competent people here, but we have foreign doctors training in this country who have no voice and no opportunity to defend themselves or their reputations. When they are being destroyed by greedy individuals like these four in my region, I think that those four people need to be held accountable. I have all of the evidence showing what these people have been doing and I will certainly be looking to have a full inquiry. We need to have them under oath and they need to be held accountable for what they are doing to this wonderful man and his family.

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