Why psy-practitioners need to think about the government

In 2001 the Health Professionals Order was passed through the Privy Council. This gave powers to some new institutional forms. One of these is the Health Professionals Council. The HPO2001 vested powers in the HPC and set the wheels in motion to employ people, pay them salaries, allocate budgets, rent offices, and start a process to enlist a huge number of people onto a centralised register. The people employed in the HPC are new to the field, and don't know much about the professions they will regulate. They don't need to. In fact, according to the logic of the HPO2001, its best if they do not. For to know something about the practice, according to the logic of HPO2001, is ipso facto to be prejudiced.

In September 2008, when the Parliament returns from recess, there will be a conversation about an ammendment to the HOP2001 which intends to give more power to the HPC. If this happens, then lots of things will follow, not all of them unpredictable. 

The law sets off from the wrong place. It assumes that professionals are not competent, are self interested and that the public needs to be protected from them. But it also assumes that there is a group of people who are innocent, never incompetent or self interested, and these are the ones who have been given the power. Ironically these are bureaucrats in the employ of the politicians. 

My main concern here is that the kinds of logic behind the current processes will have a destructive effect and expose everyone to the full force of market forces just at the time when globalisation is at its most potent. Commodification races ahead almost unchecked.

Professionals are part of the social fabric that can protect the people from the brutality of market and other forces. It is probably not a good idea to wreck that.