International

The SP is insisting that Minister of Health Ab Klink should intervene to stop Groningen University Medical Centre (UMCG) determined attempts to recruit staff from India. “What the UMCG is doing is morally irresponsible. India has a desperate need to hold on to these nurses,” says SP Member of Parliament Henk van Gerven.

In Parliament, the SP has repeatedly raised the question of the recruiting of health care personnel from eastern Europe and the Third World. Eventually, Health Minister Ab Klink recognised the undesirability of this practice and asked institutions providing health care to put a stop to it. The UMCG has, however, ignored this request. “The UMGC is the biggest employer in the province of Noord-Nederland (North Netherlands),” says Van Gerven. “That makes it certainly an institution that should be setting an example.”

Van Gerven’s view is that the UMCG’s plans should be dropped. The staffing problem, he argues, could be solved by establishing a designated training fund for specialised nurses. “A developed country such as the Netherlands should, after all, be able to solve its own problems.”

Van Gerven plans to use next week’s oral parliamentary questions to raise the matter with the minister.