Nomination for the position of president-elect of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians

Candidate Election Statement

I nominate for the position of president-elect of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians as a public health and medical research worker, educator and clinician with extensive experience in senior health management, leadership, governance and policy, and with a strong record of contribution to the RACP. As RACP president-elect I would provide leadership that advances Australia’s community of physicians and the health of Australians.

Graduating from the University of Sydney in 1966, I commenced my career in clinical medicine, and continued my clinical involvement in public health medicine and health policy.  Currently I am editor-in-chief of the Medical Journal of Australia and chair of the Western Sydney Local Health District with an annual recurrent budget of $1.4 billion.

My research interests cover all aspects of prevention through to policies for integrated care in chronic disease. With continuous NHMRC support since 1971, I have mentored many public health research workers, supervising 18 PhD students. My subsequent international interests have involved work with the Earth Institute at Columbia University in global health, especially in India.

After moving from McMaster University to Newcastle University, its medical school then in its first decade, to pursue interests in medical education, I was dean of the Sydney Medical School from 1997-2002 during a time of fundamental change to curriculum and admissions policy. I led the development of the School’s research strategy, its rural clinical schools, and its internal reorganisation. 

Throughout my career I have continually engaged with the medical and lay community through speaking in public fora and writing in the specialist and general media. I have chaired a human research ethics committee in western Sydney for 20 years, and served on and chaired many high-level working groups and committees. Senior bureaucrats and politicians of various persuasions have negotiated with me as someone whom they and others trust.

In the 1980s and 1990s I was president of the Public Health Association for four terms. I helped establish the RACP Faculty of Public Health Medicine and served on what became its board of censors and its policy arm.

My experience has impressed upon me several important insights that I consider pertinent to taking the RACP forward. 

First, whatever else a leader does his or her most important function is to be the guardian of the organisation’s core values, the keeper of meaning, ensuring that those values are expressed first in governance, then in management, and most critically in practice. 

Second, non-profit organisations such as the RACP generally work best when diversity is nurtured and all constituent groups within the organisation are supported. To maintain trust among a diverse body of fellows, power is best decentralised, shared and bestowed, and its activities owned by the fellowship.

Third, organisational management and governance, like money, really matter. Ensuring that they align with the organisation’s values is essential. Energy from its top levels is required to maintain effective, healthy management and governance.

The RACP also needs flexibility in adapting to the changing disease profile and work practices of the digital age.  Ensuring its highly visible professional functions – of credentialing, educating, nurturing and supporting physicians – is its prime responsibility. 

I would be very pleased to play a leadership role as president-elect in ensuring that the RACP continues to do that with strength and clarity.