Christopher O'Sullivan (Cork South West, Fianna Fail)
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103. To ask the Minister for Health if he will re-evaluate the eligibility criteria currently being used by the HSE mental health services for counsellor / therapist positions which seem to be restrictive (details supplied); if the same criteria are to be used for counsellor / therapist positions in schools; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [52409/22]

Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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Counsellors and psychotherapists are among a list of professions that CORU’s website confirms are soon to be regulated. The link below confirms this.

coru.ie/about-us/what-is-coru/

In February 2019 the then Minister for Health, Simon Harris TD, confirmed the establishment of, and appointment of members to, the Counsellors and Psychotherapists Registration Board, under the Health and Social Care Professionals Act 2005 (amended) to regulate the professions of Counsellors and Psychotherapists.  The Counsellors and Psychotherapists Registration Board at CORU has statutory responsibility for:

- Establishing and maintaining a Register of members of the profession

- Assessing, approving and monitoring training courses for the health and social care professions under the Act

- Establishing the Code of Professional Conduct and Ethics and standards of performance to which counsellors and psychotherapists must adhere.

HSE eligibility criteria are approved by the National Director of HR under powers conferred on her by s.22 of the Health Act 2004. Currently, eligibility criteria for certain grades of counsellor/therapist within the National Counselling Service and the Employee Assistance Programme have had their eligibility criteria so determined. But there are other grades of counsellor, therapist, and psychotherapist that have not had their eligibility criteria formally approved. Whether or not eligibility criteria have been formally approved, the first criterion will invariably specify an academic qualification, usually couched as one of a number of alternative courses. However, once CORU registration is required, the first criterion in any set of eligibility criteria for posts in this sphere will be that

“...candidates must be registered or eligible to be registered in the appropriate division of the Counsellors and Psychotherapists Registration Board maintained by CORU”

The precise wording will be agreed when the CORU register closes.

When the register closes, all counsellors and psychotherapists will require to be registered with CORU. It will then be for CORU to determine which qualifications within and outwith the State will entitle applicants to be registered. HSE eligibility criteria will no longer have to specify which academic qualifications make an applicant eligible for CORU registration.