§ Baroness Jay of Paddingtonasked Her Majesty's Government:
On what basis candidates were selected to serve on the newly established General Osteopathic Council, and whether they are satisfied that sufficient consultation was held with different schools of practising osteopaths to ensure that the membership is properly representative of the profession as a whole.
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Baroness Cumberlege)The twelve osteopathic members and three of the education members of the General Osteopathic Council (a fourth education member is appointed by the Secretary of State for Education and Employment) were selected from among those nominated by the following osteopathic organisations, which exercise a registering function and are understood to have close ties with the training institutions: British Osteopathic Association; British and European Osteopathic Association; College of Osteopaths; General Council and Register of Osteopaths; Guild of Osteopaths; Natural Therapeutic and Osteopathic Society. These organisations were identified by the King's Fund Working Party on Osteopathy, in its 1991 report, as being all the main osteopathic bodies in the United Kingdom with a registering function, as derived from an earlier 1989 report of the Monopolies and Mergers Commission on the services of professionally regulated osteopaths. The members were selected on the basis of individual merit98WA and relevant experience, and the particular skills they could bring to the new council. They were chosen as ambassadors for the whole profession and not as representatives of any particular organisation or group.
The eight lay members of the General Osteopathic Council were selected, on the basis of individual merit and relevant skills, from the nominations received from a wide range of national organisations in the field of health, business, law, consumer interests and from the Public Appointments Unit of the Cabinet Office.
§ Baroness Jay of Paddingtonasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether it is appropriate, given the provisions of the Osteopaths Act 1993 which state that the chairman of the General Osteopathic Council should be a lay person, that the appointed chairman is a qualified osteopath and an expert adviser to the Department of Health on Complementary Medicine.
§ Baroness CumberlegeThe provisions of the Osteopaths Act 1993 relevant to the appointment of the first chairman of the General Osteopathic Council are as follows. The first chairman is to be appointed under paragraph 48 in Part III (Transitional Provisions) of the schedule to the Act, which requires the appointment to be made by the Privy Council from among the "lay members". In paragraph 45(2), the term "lay member" is defined as a "member designated under this paragraph", that is to say the eight members to be appointed by the Privy Council of whom seven shall be persons who are not registered osteopaths at the time of their appointment (the other is to be a registered medical practitioner, who must not be a registered osteopath). Under paragraph 45(3), during the relevant transitional period, "registered osteopath" is to be read as "a person appearing to the Privy Council to be a practising osteopath".
Mr. Simon Fielding OBE, although professionally qualified as an osteopath, is a non-practising osteopath—due to injuries originally sustained several years ago. In view of this fact and the statutory provisions outlined, he was eligible for appointment as a lay member, and as chairman, of the General Osteopathic Council.