A DISGRACED North Yorkshire doctor is set to be appointed by the General Medical Council to investigate incompetent colleagues.

And it was also revealed today that obstetrician Dr Richard Neale was given a £100,000 severance pay-off when he left Friarage Hospital at Northallerton in 1995.

Dr Neale was struck off in Canada for incompetence in the 1980s after the death of a patient. It was alleged he tampered with drugs records after her death.

But he was subsequently appointed to work at the Friarage. In 1993 he was cautioned by police and disciplined by bosses at the Friarage after being arrested in a Richmond public lavatory.

The arrest followed a breach of the peace, in which two other men engaged in an intimate act were also arrested.

A BBC 2 regional documentary, Close Up North, to be shown at 7.30pm tonight, reveals that he was given the big pay-off by Northallerton NHS Trust to leave his post at the Friarage in 1995.

And the programme has also discovered that the GMC intended appointing him as an assessor in medical "hit squads" aimed at weeding out failing doctors.

Producer Barry Wood said the council had said it could not take into account a disciplinary proceedings abroad when considering such matters.

The GMC said today in a statement that Dr Neale had been included in a list of 400 prospective assessors, but his employment was subject to checks which have not yet been completed.

"Confirmation of appointment as an assessor, and selection for a particular assessment visit, are subject to satisfactory current references and successful completion of our training.

"If those further checks produced information to suggest that a doctor was unsuitable, they would be removed from the list."

A spokeswoman said the council was aware of an incident relating to Dr Neale in Canada in 1984, and it was in touch with the Canadian authorities to ensure it had a full picture, and it would look very carefully at Dr Neale's suitability as an assessor in the light of that information.

The Evening Press was today unable to contact Dr Neale, who lives at Langthorpe, near Boroughbridge.

But the Daily Mail today quoted him as saying that the GMC knew all about his past, and that he thought he would be able to offer some insight to other doctors who were in trouble. "A wounded person is often the best healer."

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