URGENT changes are needed to checks made on foreign doctors before they give out-of-hours care, MPs have said.

The Health Committee inquiry was prompted by the death of Blakedown GP Stuart Gray’s father, David, from a painkiller overdose given by German Dr Daniel Ubani.

It found NHS Trusts were failing to check the “language skills and clinical competence” of doctors.

This meant locums with poor English and a lack of “general practice expertise” were being employed, leading to “poor care and the deaths of patients”, the report says.

Dr Gray has been calling for the out-of-hours care system to be overhauled since his father died in February 2008.

“There needs to be more accountability for foreign doctors in this country,” he said. “They need more than a few hours’ training before coming into the UK. It really is unacceptable.”

David Gray, 70, was given 10 times the dose of diamorphine he required by Dr Ubani during a visit at his Cambridgeshire home.

Dr Ubani was on his first shift in the UK and was employed by Take Care Now - which, until this month, provided out-of-hours care in Worcestershire.

His poor English meant he was refused work by the NHS in Leeds, but he was later accepted in Cornwall, which then led to work in Cambridgeshire.

The GMC cannot carry out clinical or language checks on doctors from EU countries under European regulations.

The Health Committee has recommended that changes are made to an EU Directive to allow the GMC to carry out these tests.

Kevin Barron, chairman of the committee, said: "It is tragic that it takes the death of a patient to expose the serious failings now evident in the current system for checking language and competence skills of overseas doctors.

"Everything possible must be done as soon as possible to ensure another life is not lost in this way."

A spokesman for the Department of Health said: "Before a new European Economic Area (EEA) doctor can work in the UK, they have to apply and be accepted onto a local PCT performers list.”

He added: “"PCTs were recently reminded that they should have undertaken all the checks to ensure that doctors on their lists have the necessary skills. A review of the Perfomers List is being undertaken and as part of this, a national database of GPs is being looked at."