Dan Neville (Limerick, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for her response. It is welcome that Quality and Qualifications Ireland, QQI, is setting down the standards which were promised in 2012 by the Minister for Health during the debate on the Health and Social Care Professionals (Amendment) Bill. I was told previously that regulation of these two professions would happen when all of the other professions referred to in the Act were regulated. I put it to the Minister of State that counselling and psychotherapy are as important as the other professions to which she referred. They were not included in the 2005 Act because when the legislation was going through the House, the then Minister of State at the Department of Health, former Deputy Tim O'Malley, said the professions had not reached agreement on the process of regulating counselling and psychotherapy. He argued that in such circumstances statutory regulation would have serious legal implications. While accepting the principle of the need to regulate these professions, he argued that he would wait for agreement to be reached before doing so. Agreement was reached several years later and a joint report by 22 bodies outlined how best to regulate counselling and psychotherapy. It was not done originally because of the lack of agreement among the professional bodies, but they stated in their report, submitted to the then Minister of State, former Deputy John Moloney, that it was necessary to have statutory regulation. There is no such regulation. I could set myself up as a counsellor in the morning and do untold damage. The Bodywhys organisation, for example, is extremely concerned about this because it has received several complaints from families with members suffering from eating disorders who received counselling which was highly dangerous.

See this speech in context