Written answers

Wednesday, 8 February 2017

Department of Health

Psychological Services

Photo of Clare DalyClare Daly (Dublin Fingal, Independent)
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213. To ask the Minister for Health further to Parliamentary Questions Nos. 44 of 19 January 2017, 98 of 24 January 2017, 110 of 25 January 2017 and 115 of 31 January 2017, if he will initiate discussions with the Minister for Justice and Equality in regard to the possibility of her making orders on non-statutory accrediting bodies for psychologists or psychotherapists under sections 40(6)(b) and 40(7)(b) of the Civil Liability and Courts Act 2004, such that those accrediting bodies for psychologists and psychotherapists may be empowered under those sections to investigate complaints regarding the conduct of the professionals under their aegis in compiling section 47 reports, at least until such time as these two professions are regulated by CORU. [6233/17]

Photo of Simon HarrisSimon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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The Health and Social Care Professionals Act 2005 provides for the determination of complaints relating to the fitness to practice of practitioners qualified to register and to use the titles of the professions designated under the Act. The Health and Social Care Professionals Council, the registration boards for the professions which it oversees and the various disciplinary committees are all established under the Act and are known under the umbrella name of CORU.

The profession of psychologist is one of the fourteen professions currently designated under the Act and I have recently undertaken a public consultation on the proposal to regulate psychotherapists under the Act. I expect to be in a position to establish the Psychologists Registration Board and appoint its members in the coming months. I am currently considering the submissions received on the proposed regulation of psychotherapists and I will decide shortly on how best to proceed with this proposal.

Some professional bodies undertake investigations of complaints about their members. These are not statutory investigations and I have no function in them. It would be a matter for the professional bodies themselves, in the first instance, to decide whether they wish to seek access to documents, information or evidence prepared for, or given in, family law proceedings.

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