Psychological Therapists call on Government to introduce statutory registration for their professions in Ireland

An umbrella group representing over 5,000 counsellors and psychotherapists in Ireland has called on the government to introduce statutory registration for their profession in this country without delay.

This afternoon (September 23, 2008) the Psychological Therapies Forum presented agreed recommendations for the statutory training and regulation of counselling and psychotherapy to Mr. John Maloney, T.D., Minister of State at the Department of Health & Children with responsibility for mental health.

They called on the Minister to include statutory registration of psychological therapists in the next phase of the Health & Social Care Professionals Bill 2004.  The Bill already provides for the statutory registration of 12 other health and social care professions including psychology and social work.

The Psychological Therapies Forum is seeking a registration board titled “Psychological Therapists” for counsellors and psychotherapists and has recommended baseline academic qualifications for entry to training and baseline qualification and experience for registration and for grand parenting practising practitioners.

“We believe it is imperative that the public is protected by promoting high standards of education, training, competence and conduct among the counselling and psychotherapy professions.” Forum representative, Derval Ryan told the Minister at the presentation of the submission to him in the Davenport Hotel, Dublin.

She said that at present this protection is provided by a process of self regulation by a number of professional organisations which lay down for their members strict standards of on-going education, training and ethics as well as a complaints system to protect the public.

“While this works very well for those who are accredited to a professional body, there is no redress for complaints against practitioners who are not members of a professional body.   It is possible for anybody to call herself or himself a counsellor or psychotherapist and to set up in practice without the required training and competence and there is no redress board or sanctions for complaints against them and indeed no way to prevent practitioners who have been disciplined by their accrediting body from continuing to practise.”
In November 2005, Mr. Tim O’Malley, the then Minister with responsibility for mental health initiated a consultation process on the statutory regulation and registration of counselling and psychotherapy in Ireland.   He requested the organisations to engage in a process that would result in an agreed framework for standards within these professions.  He said this work should be carried out with a view to including counselling and psychotherapy in the next phase of the Health & Social Care Professionals Bill 2004.

Following the Minister’s request, the Psychological Therapies Forum, which represents the professional organisations for psychotherapists and counsellors in Ireland was formed and has spent the last three years drawing up the current submission to government.

Forum representative, Gillford D’Souza said “We would like to strongly urge that counselling and psychotherapy be included in the next phase of professions to be regulated under the Act.  We are unified in this submission and we believe we need regulation for the protection of the pubic by establishing standards, holding practitioners to a regulation and taking action when practitioners do not meet the standards set.”

John Farrelly who chaired the event, concluded that “The recommendations we have made here today should create a consensual and smooth pathway into the future, ensuring Ireland is at the cutting edge of psychological therapy while offering the public optimal protection.

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Gillford D’Souza; Derval Ryan; Minister John Moloney; Rhoda Draper; John Farrelly at the Psychological Therapies Forum Launch 23 September 2008

ICP Inaugural Master Class – Squaring the Circle

The Irish Council For Psychotherapy (ICP)  organised an inaugural Master Class on Friday, 26th September 2008 in St. Patrick’s Hospital.
This Master Class was presented by Ms. Isolde Blau, Director of Laragh Counselling Service and Founding Member of the HSE National Counselling Service.
The Master Class was entitled :
Squaring the Circle
Balancing Child Protection and Risk Management
In Clinical settings
Attached is the presentation by Isolde Blau, together with questions which arose from the floor.

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NIIHR Upcoming Events

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‘Engleby – “Reduced to half a dozen non-sequiturs in blue bic on an HMSO form”’ : A Seminar by Rob Weatherill

Friday 10^th October 2008

Institute Seminar Room, 2 Malone Road, Belfast

Further Details: David Smith -  00 44 791 9907136

-  niinstitutehr@googlemail.com

 

The first part of this full day seminar will centre around a discussion of Sebastian Faulk’s 2007 novel, Engleby – the aim being to provide an enjoyable and accessible introduction to the three registers of Lacanian theory.

 

In the second part, clinical material will be presented and explored from a variety of perspectives – including Lacanian, Freudian and Kleinian. Any participant who wishes to present carefully anonymised case material within a strictly confidential setting should contact Christine Christie on 02890 668598  to discuss this.

 

A member of the Irish Psycho-Analytical Association, Rob Weatherill is a psychoanalyst  and author with over thirty years clinical experience of working in private practice. He has taught psychoanalysis in both Trinity College Dublin and University College Dublin, and describes himself as ‘a committed eclectic’.

                                             

Publications include Cultural Collapse (Free Association Books 1994) a survey of the levelling out of meanings and values in contemporary culture, and Our Last Great Illusion (Imprint Academic 2004), a radical psychoanalytic critique of therapy culture. He is the author of two books on the death drive – The Sovereignty of Death (Rebus 1998) and The Death Drive (Rebus 1999). His forthcoming book entitled Forgetting Freud? Psychoanalysis and Indifference examines the ethics of psychoanalysis and the nature of the suffering of the subject.

 

An archive of published journal articles and conference papers can be viewed at www.criticalpsychoanalysis.com.

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 ‘Psychotherapy and Spirituality: Where the Waters Meet’: A Conference hosted by the NI Institute of Human Relations in association with the All Ireland Spiritual Guidance Association

Friday 14^th November 2008

Slieve Croob, Castlewellan, County Down

Further Details: Gordon Graham  -  00 44 28 4372 6175

                                                      - gorbargrah@aol.com

 

This will be the fourth annual ‘Psychotherapy and Spirituality’ conference, furthering the dialogue which has been ongoing now since 2005. This year’s keynote address will be given by counsellor and author David Buckley, whose recently published Where the Waters Meet (Karnac 2008) has been hailed as a landmark in establishing intersections, parallel lexicons and important boundaries between psychotherapy and spirituality.

 

 

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

An Evidence-based model for understanding and treating PTSD.

A 2-day workshop with Dr. Kate Gillespie and Dr. Michael Duffy. Guest Speaker: Professor David M. Clark.

Friday 19th and Saturday 20th September 2008 in Tallaght Cross Hotel, Tallaght, Dublin 24.

cognitive-behavioural-therapy-workshop.pdf

9th EPCA Conference: Construing PCP: New Contexts and Perspectives

The 9th EPCA Conference will be held in London from the 29th June 2008 to the 1st July 2008. EPCA bi-annual conference is aimed at bringing together scholars and practitioners who are interested in Personal Construct Psychology (PCP). We explore the use of PCP and its tools in research, clinical and organisational practice.

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The Psychoanalytic Therapy of Severe Disturbance International Conference

This is an international event designed to offer a state of the art communication of the key psychoanalytic thinking and approaches to the conceptualisation and treatment of severe disturbance.

Download the-psychoanalytic-therapy-of-severe-disturbance.pdf

Download the-psychoanalytic-therapy-of-severe-disturbance-registration-form.pdf

Despair Dialogue Desire 14th European Symposium in Group Analysis

The 14th European Symposium in Group Analysis will be held in the University of Dublin, Trinity College on the 18th – 22nd August 2008. For further information please see the Symposium website at http://www.dublin-gas-symposium.com