Report and evidence taken by the Committee appointed to enquire into the pay, status, and conditions of service of the medical officers of the army : with evidence concerning the Indian Service and some of the more important appendices. April 1890.

Great Britain. War Office. Committee on the Pay, Status and Conditions of Service of Medical Officers of the Army [and Navy].

Date:: 1890

Credit: Report and evidence taken by the Committee appointed to enquire into the pay, status, and conditions of service of the medical officers of the army : with evidence concerning the Indian Service and some of the more important appendices. April 1890. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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With reference to the administrative Officers, it has been pointed out that they are often physically fit to serve after 60, and our attention has been specially directed to the public disadvantage which has arisen from Surgeons- General being unable to proceed to India on duty, owing to their near approach to their age of retirement. We do not see any reason why Surgeons-General should not continue to serve until the age of 62. It is obvious that our recommendation must involve very careful selection for promotion to the highest ranks. The right to retire after 20 years’ service is one of the inducements which was given by the War Office in 1867. This right is much .valued by Medical Officers, and has been used to a considerable extent. It must, however, be remembered that many who have thus retired have merely substituted this mode for that of retirement on the certificate of a Medical Board on the ground of health. As these Officers are liable, until they attain the age of 55, to be recalled to serve in the event of a national emergency, they form an important Army Medical Reserve. We submitted a case to the Actuaries of the War Office with a view of seeing what advantage would accrue to the State by the postponement of the right to retire to 25 years. Their report is that the total result would be as nearly as possible the same, inasmuch as the full pay vote would be raised by a sum almost identical with the diminution of the retired pay vote. We fear that the Accountant-General of the Army is correct in assuming that the non-effective medical charge must always be proportionally heavy. We are unwilling, without very strong reason, to recommend any alteration in the conditions of service which were laid down in 1879; but without altering the conditions of retirement or the rates of retired pay, more service may fairly be required from Medical Officers. With this view we recommend that a careful enquiry be made into the establishments of the station hospitals at home and abroad, and that the Medical Officers in charge of them should be required to take'a fair share of the executive duty. A certain term of service should be required from Officers after promotion to a higher rank before they are permitted to retire upon the rates attaching to the higher rank, except in cases of permanent ill health contracted in and by the Service. Surgeons-General and Deputy Surgeons-General should serve in those ranks for at least two years, and Brigade-Surgeons as such for three years. It appears to us, however, that the financial saving must be effected chiefly by limiting, as much as possible, the establishment of Officers, and by requiring a sufficient amount of work from every Officer. At small home stations, where experience shows that, as a general rule, there is not more than two or three hours’ ordinary daily work for the Medical Officer in charge of the troops, civil practitioners should be employed where practicable. 3. Rank, Title. With regard to the questions of rank and title, the Medical Officers of the Army, and especially the younger Officers, are not contented with their present position. Their discontent is not of recent origin, although it was only manifested after the appearance of the Royal Warrant of 1877, which omitted all reference to, and so by implication abolished relative rank. The abolition of relative rank enabled Medical Officers to say, with a certain amount of logical correctness, that they now have no rank iu the Army; relative rank, which they contend was the only rank they ever held, having disappeared. The Royal Warrant of 1877 was however the occasion rather than the cause of the complaint of the Medical Officers. They admit that there never was any real substance attaching to the term relative rank ; they admit, moreover, that the restoration of relative rank would not satisfy their grievance. Nobody contends that, with regard to pay and all other practical questions, the Royal Warrant of 1887 affected Medical Officers prejudicially; nor did it alter the precedence of Medical Officers in relation to other Officers of the Army. The grievance of the Medical Officers of the Army appears to us to have originated in great part from the abolition of the regimental system. Formerly the Medical Officer was part of his regiment just as in the Royal Navy, where no complaint on this score exists, he is now part of the complement of his ship.

Report and evidence taken by the Committee appointed to enquire into the pay, status, and conditions of service of the medical officers of the army : with evidence concerning the Indian Service and some of the more important appendices. April 1890.

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