Tom Neville (Limerick County, Fine Gael)
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395. To ask the Minister for Health the outcome of the consultations which took place with an organisation (details supplied) in relation to the designation by regulation of the professions of counsellor and psychotherapist under section 4(2) of the Health and Social Care Professionals Act 2005 to enable him to regulate designating the professions to be regulated and prescribing the titles to be protected [43948/17]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 385 and 395 together.

Following consultation with the Health and Social Care Professionals Council, as required under the Health and Social Care Professionals Act 2005, I undertook a wider public consultation on my proposal to regulate counsellors and psychotherapists under the Act. The Council's submission and those of the respondents to the public consultation are available on my Department's website, www.health.gov.ie. On foot of these consultations, I decided to proceed with the designation of two distinct professions under the Act, that of counsellor and psychotherapist. Each will have its own register under one registration board. This decision was communicated to the Health and Social Care Professionals Council, the relevant professional bodies and all the respondents to the public consultation process.

I expect that the draft regulations to designate the professions and to establish the registration board will be ready for submission to the Houses of the Oireachtas in the coming weeks. Subject to the approval of the Houses, the next step will be the appointment of the 13 members of the registration board following the submission of suitable candidates for my consideration by the Public Appointments Service. I hope that the registration board will be in a position early next year to begin the task of drafting the various by-laws to allow it to establish its registers.