Sir: From December 2000, additional duty hours will be replaced by a banding system based on the time spent ‘actually working’ on call. Psychiatry trainees will be paid significantly less than their colleagues in other specialities, who have shorter rest periods. While to an extent this is justified, the size of the pay differential is alarming and the higher level of stress experienced by psychiatrists (Reference Dreary, Blenkin and AgiusDreary et al, 1996) is not recognised.

A house officer choosing a career may be faced with either a pay cut of £48 per year to take up psychiatry or a raise of £6413 per year to do general medicine. With the introduction of tuition fees, the British Medical Association estimates that the debts of final year medical students will rise from an average of £7738 in 1998 (Reference BrooksBrooks, 1998) to up to £25 000 (British Medical Association, 1997). This will have grave implications for recruitment to psychiatry. The College needs to address this issue if it wants to attract doctors into our speciality.