Brief report on the 8th meeting of the HPC Professional Liaison Group (PLG) for Psychotherapists and Counsellors
By Carmen Joanne Ablack, UKCP PLG Representative
Meeting held on 19 October 2010, 10.30am - 4.30pm
(Please note this is not meant as a verbatim report of proceedings, it is more an attempt to capture what happened. Thank you, Carmen)
Movement forward on regulation
This 8th PLG meeting took place at the Dominion Theatre, London and could presage a breakthrough for the professional bodies and organisations represented at the table.
The day started with a presentation from the Association of Christian Counsellors (ACC) - an organisation made up of affiliated counsellors and affiliated organisations. Most of their members choose to offer entirely voluntary services as counsellors, with a smaller number providing a mixture of voluntary and paid work. They have approximately 2,000 individual members and 150 organisational members.
ACC gave a helpful summary of their own work and then mainly focussed on presenting an exploration of the issues facing the PLG, emphasising that they understood the regulator's concern to be what is current, rather than what is aspirational, in the field.
Their presentation allowed the PLG to tease out some important questions regarding accessibility for clients and practitioners, inclusivity to the register and public safety. The other question that was explored related to the point of entry to the register, ACC felt it important that regulation paid attention to both experience and qualifications - a balance between the academic, life experience and ability to relate to people.
They had no problem with the concept of two levels for counselling; and told the PLG that if access to the register was made too difficult (expensive, too high a threshold entry level for counsellors) then there was a genuine risk of a reduction in the provision of voluntary counselling services at a time when people will be looking for more free provision.
The meeting was also reminded that the work of volunteer counsellors was part of the infrastructure of provision in Scotland and these were mainly level 4 qualified counsellors.
In the background to this specific PLG meeting were meetings between different professional bodies and groups of senior professionals looking at the questions of differentiation between counselling at level 5, counselling at level 7 and psychotherapy at level 7 and entry to the statutory register.
On Friday 15th October, Carmen was part of a crucial meeting of the working group on differentiation and standards, a sub-group of the PPAG. This small group, chaired by Sue Gardner of the BPS, and attended by representatives from BACP, BPC and UKCP has begun to map differentiating standards for level 5 counsellors and to identify the possibilities for shared and separated standards at two level 7 titles of adjectival counsellor and psychotherapist.
The working group was able to table the following statement for the PLG members at their meeting:
"Statement from PPAG working group -
PPAG has been addressing the structure of HPC Register in relation to psychotherapy and counselling for some time. The main sticking point was always the issue of differentiation between psychotherapy and counselling.
A breakthrough of sorts was achieved when there emerged a degree of consensus around the adoption of a three-title model (with two threshold entry training levels) which held the prospect of a more nuanced approach than the straightforward binary opposition between counselling and psychotherapy.
The three titles are:
- counsellor (with a threshold entry training level at NQF Level 5)
- (adjectival title still to be determined) counsellor(with a threshold entry training level at NQF Level 7)
- psychotherapist (with a threshold entry training level at NQF Level 7).
However, PPAG was unable to agree at that stage as to whether the two level 7 titles were interchangeable or differential. All parties considered that we should attempt to progress an approach that would attempt to delineate demonstrable similarities and differences if and where they existed.
Sue Gardner, President (sic) of BPS, agreed to convene a working group to progress this work, which has now met once (on 15th October).
It has begun by mapping out the issues and identifying areas of agreement and disagreement. There was a good atmosphere and we found more that joins us than divides us. The group believes that the three title model holds the best prospects of a solution that can win the broad assent of the professions.
We hope with greater clarity that we will be able to pick apart the issues we began with and the organisations involved are committed to working together in taking this work further."
Michael Guthrie reminded the meeting that:
- The regulator will register at the point when the title is used and the threshold is a normative expectation that applies to programmes seeking approval.
- One of the key considerations for this meeting and for the PLG as a whole was the impact of differentiating or not differentiating between counselling and psychotherapy, including considerations about how impact could be mitigated.
- Use of separately regulated titles means (differentiating) separate standards of proficiency, looking at possible conversions routes, issues of education and training and public perception considerations.
The task that remains to be done was named by a member of the PLG as the definition of psychotherapy by psychotherapists (and the definition of counselling by counsellors) in terms that meet the need for public protection.
It is only by doing this that a proper comparison could be made between counselling and psychotherapy to see if the differentiation actually exists. Such SOPs must be sound, coherent and robust.
A key question that faces the counselling profession is to demonstrate to the PLG that L5 to L7 counsellor is not just a continuum, but actually two distinct titles requiring separate differentiating SOPs. That convinces the PLG that there is a need for another point of entry for counselling, beyond level 5.
A key question that faces the psychotherapy profession is to demonstrate that level 7 psychotherapy is a distinct activity, and thus definable through standards of proficiency that are different (at least in part) to those defining counselling at level 7.
In order for this work to happen it was agreed that the next PLG on November 15th would not take place.
HPC will let the members of the group know by what date papers will be needed showing the work created; and for one document to come from PPAG, (rather than separate documents from different professional bodies).
The PPAG sub-group and the PPAG main group will meet in early December.
These meetings will be before the next PLG meeting, which is now on 15th December 2010 between 10.30am and 4.30pm
Brief summary report of the HPC PLG meeting held on 12 May 2010
Thank you to Judith Lask, I have used much of her report to the UKCP Systemic College to produce this brief summary report. A fuller report is being prepared and will be uploaded soon.
This meeting was to review the results of the December consultation and to set out a work plan for the next phase of work. The HPC council had acknowledged that there was still a lot of work to be done in order to refine the scheme for regulation of psychotherapists and counselors.
The Group was chaired by the President of HPC, Anna van der Gaag, in the absence of Diane Waller who was sick. She was appointed to the chair by the group and chaired it well. This was technically the 6th meeting of the PLG, but given the hiatus of a year and a change of people it was in effect a new start of the PLG.
The meeting began with a round robin for everyone to comment on how they saw things. There was an acknowledgement of further work to be done. The meeting was informed by a discussion document prepared by Michael Guthrie. There was an acknowledgement also of the need for further work and specifically mentioned was:
- The distinction or not between counselling and psychotherapy
- The issue of differentiating those who work with children and young people
- Refinement of the standards of proficiency (SOPS)
Mention was made by a number of people from different professional bodies and organisations about the opposition to regulation by HCP in the profession and the importance of listening to this and hopefully making amendments that would carry the profession with the work.
It had been a year since the last meeting and there had been discussions in all the organisations represented. There was also a stress on the importance of keeping protection of clients at the centre of the group's thinking and to keep asking what effect particular standards would have on the services offered to them and to their protection.
Another theme was the need to wherever possible have reference to evidence. There was an agreement on the importance of taking account of the diversity of the client group and diversity of ways of delivering services (including private practice).
There was some discussion about ways of capturing the importance of the therapeutic relationship in standards of proficiency and discussion about the way the relationship in therapy was actually the service in a different way than other professions. There was some degree of difference on this issue but general agreement on the importance of the relationship.
There was strong agreement that the user perspective had not been included sufficiently in the work and the need to hear from clients who had been satisfied as well as those who had been harmed with their service.
There was some discussion on entry levels for psychotherapy and counselling and clarification that SOPS did not match with levels as they could be delivered at a number of different levels. SOPS also do not describe everything that someone does and are not learning outcomes. Some concern was expressed that standards of education and training should take account of more than SOPS and also include requirements on hours. Some discussion on personal therapy and there was a slightly uneasy agreement that "work on self" could be done in a number of ways and not just personal therapy.
More work is to be done in June by the HPC Education and Training Committee on the generic standards of proficiency.
Any SOPS and SETS (standards of education and training) must not lead to a closing down of diversity in the profession.
Next steps: the PLG and HPC would seek to hear the views of a number of people: service users, international perspective, views of the professions including those in opposition to HPC, representations on differentiation for those working with children.
Between Sept and Dec there would be four stakeholders' meetings (one in each home country) which would provide an opportunity to hear a range of views and also meetings for the group to hear representations on each topic followed by discussion. In February there would be a whole day meeting. There is a crucial HPC Council meeting in May. There was a bid not to leave the contentious issues till late in the process - this had happened last time.
There is uncertainty with the change of government and legislative diary.
Judith's conclusion: Overall it was a good meeting. It is clear that there are various differences around the table but also some important agreements but a lot of work to be done.
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