Health Professions Council Public Liaison Group
Counsellors and Psychotherapists
4 December 2008

The first meeting of the Health Professions Council (HPC) Professional Liaison Group (PLG) meeting for Counsellors and Psychotherapists was held on 4 December 2008. There was a full complement of observers for the first meeting.

The meeting began with a welcome from the HPC President, Anna van de Gaag, followed by introductions from all of the PLG members.

Niall McDermott from the Department of Health (DH) gave a presentation on the legislative process for regulating a profession which takes between 18 and 24 months. The draft legislation will be subject to a three month consultation and the DH will also carry out an impact assessment. He stated that the earliest date for the regulation of counsellors and psychotherapists was 2011.

Michael Guthrie, Head of Policy and Standards at the HPC, followed with a presentation of the PLG process. The PLG will consider specific aspects at each meeting and the full submissions, based on responses from the Call for Ideas, on each topic will be circulated to members before the meeting and the papers will also be published on the HPC website one week prior to the meeting. The PLG recommendations will go to the HPC Council in July 2009 and then will be subject to a three month consultation before going back to Council and then passing to the DH.

The remainder of the meeting was given over to a discussion of the general comments in the Call for Ideas responses including the opposition to regulation and the role of the Skills for Health (SfH) National Occupational Standards (NOS) in regulation.

The focus of the next two day meeting (28 and 29 January) is the structure of the register and protected titles.