“Right now, we’re not part of the federal AMA.”
They were the comments from the AMA WA’s president, Dr Michael Page, talking on Perth radio earlier this month about the stoush taking place with the group’s Federal branch.
“I do not intend to go over the arguments and counterarguments again, other than to reiterate our obvious disappointment with the approach taken by AMA Federal, during what we believed to be an improving, good-faith negotiation process,” Dr Page said.
“The negotiations became difficult, but they were ongoing and then the Federal AMA blindsided us by actually telling us that they were cutting off negotiations, even though they were continuing in good faith and said, ‘look, your members are no longer members of the Federation.’”
AMA Board chair Dr Mark Duncan-Smith and the association wrote to its 5000 WA members at the beginning of March to tell them “that their membership had ceased because the WA branch had abandoned a long-standing practice of collecting federal dues with state fees for forwarding them on, so there was no avenue for WA doctors to be ordinary AMA members.”
However, Dr Page says each State branch of the AMA is an autonomous organisation, completely independent from one another, and the disagreement came down to supporting value for local members in fee allocation.
“We have this arrangement so that a proportion of our member fees goes to the AMA office in Canberra, so that they can do the advocacy and lobbying on behalf of doctors and patients that needs to be done at a national level, and we support that, and we have supported that for a long time,” he said.
“Now, we haven’t had a formal agreement with AMA Federal for a number of years now, and over the last couple of years we’ve been trying to really renegotiate the terms of the agreement because in the end, we’re stewards — our members pay a reasonable amount of money to be our members and we’re stewards of their money, and we need to make sure they get good value.
“In the end, we need to make sure that all the AMAs, the state AMAs and the Federal AMA can continue to operate. Costs are rising. We’ve had a couple of tough trading years. We’re coming out the other side of that, but we need to make sure that we’re strong into the future.
“They need to also be cognisant of the fact that we are not the only state that’s raising these issues with them. QLD, VIC, and SA have all been raising exactly the same issues with the federal body, and so it’s not as though we’re the naughty child over here in the Wild West.”
The AMA WA held a member forum to provide clarity and enable members to air their views and ask questions following receipt of the letter, which Dr Page said was well-attended and generated significant debate.
“Although difficult questions were asked, I was buoyed by the interest shown by the many ex-State and Federal AMA presidents, vice-presidents and other attendees who have contributed significantly to our activities over the decades,” he said.
“The passion from this group for a sustainably strong AMA (WA)and AMA Federal was clear. The general practice voice was also strong, with a clear desire expressed for AMA (WA) members to continue supporting the advocacy of AMA at a Federal level, which is of particular relevance in general practice, as well as other Medicare-dependent specialties.”
The AMA (WA) Board has committed to weekly meetings with regular contact in-between for “the foreseeable future” while negotiations continue.
“We will provide regular updates as we go, noting that some of the more detailed aspects of active negotiations require confidentiality to respect the rights of both parties,” Dr Page said.