The General Medical Council (GMC) offices in central Manchester have been visited by Health Secretary Sajid Javid, with the Secretary of State formally opening GMC’s temporary Clinical Assessment Centre located at the site.
Sajid Javid has been in Manchester for the Conservative Party Conference and received a tour of the facility.
The temporary centre, located at the GMC’s Hardman Street base in Spinningfields, will be used to assess the skills of overseas-qualified doctors who want to work in the UK.
Any doctor who qualified outside the UK and EEA must pass the PLAB (Professional and Linguistic Assessments Board) exam before they’re able to join the medical register and receive a license to practice medicine in the UK.
The assessment centre began operating earlier this year.
The temporary site was established to complement the GMC’s existing Manchester test centre, helping the regulator return overall testing capacity back to pre-Covid levels.
During the hands-on tour, the Health Secretary was introduced to a range of GMC staff, examiners, and role players, who act as patients during the exams.
He was also joined during the tour by GMC’s acting Chair, Professor Dame Carrie MacEwen, and Chief Executive Charlie Massey.
