Macquarie University has launched the first year of its full-fee medical degree, “marking the start of an exciting journey.” Not to mention an expensive one, local students will pay $64 000 per annum for the four-year degree. The MU degree is loathed by the med ed establishment which says there are enough doctors being educated without it. But because Macquarie U met teaching standards and isn’t costing Canberra they could not stop it. They might have more luck with the Murray Darling Medical School, which Charles Sturt and La Trobe Us want to establish in regional NSW and Victoria. The existing med schools hate the MDMS plan not least because it would likely take public funding, and hospital training places, away from them but the National Party rank and file love it. Yesterday some in the med ed establishment thought they had seen the challenge off, at least for this year.