CTUK gets some answers from the BACP: Question 3

Have you come across Counsellors Together UK (CTUK)? They are a large community of therapists that have been created to challenge and put an end to the culture and prevelance of unpaid work within our profession.

• Website: www.ukcounsellors.co.uk
• Email: info@ukcounsellors.co.uk
• Facebook Page: Counsellors Together UK
• Twitter: @UK_Counsellors

I’ve been very lucky to get to know several of the leaders within CTUK and the community as a whole. They are incredibly well organised and are keen to challenge unfair treatment of therapists by their membership bodies. They support over 7000 therapists in the UK.

BACP – SCoPEd questions:

The CTUK community sent a series of questions to the BACP (and I believe also the UKCP, BPC etc) to get some clarity on the issues that will impact on us. On 15th December they published the answers that they received from the BACP. I’m very surprised that they heard something back before Christmas! Their published answers have not been analysed by CTUK, so I thought I’d look at the issues and highlight some of the key parts that I picked up.

---

Question 3: In creating this hierarchy, you are clearly stating that counselling, advanced counselling and psychotherapy are three different things. Can you provide a clear definition of each one please? 

The removal of titles from the framework still doesn’t make sense to me. The first iteration showed their intentions clearly. A Client First (Erin Stevens) explained the Counsellor, Advanced Counsellor and Psychotherapist hierarchy expertly last year in her article “A Deeper Look at SCoPEd: So what is ‘Advanced Counsellor’ Anyway?” She especially highlighted the issue around the framework allegedly defining entry points to the profession, whereas the second column (now, column B) appears to prioritise accredited therapists – who need at least 150 hours post-qualification practice…

The BACP answer to this quesiton discusses their rationale for moving away from the titles, and completely avoids actually defining the 3 columns. It’s clear (in my view) that they are sticking with their original thoughts on the matter, but know that the wider counselling and psychotherapy community will disagree with.

Honestly, this response doesn’t answer the question.