Public health specialists: regulation
Download the full outcome
Detail of outcome
The department received 168 responses from a range of organisations and from individuals.
Whilst there was broad support for the provisions of the Section 60 Order, there was a more mixed response to the questions on the identity of the regulator. However the majority of organisations supported the proposal to regulate through the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) and we are going to proceed on that basis, with the following 2 changes:
- public health specialists who have retained registration with a regulator other than the HCPC should not be required to have dual registration
- the protected title is to be ‘public health specialist’
Original consultation
Consultation description
Non-medical or dental public health specialists are going to be subject to statutory regulation by the HCPC instead of registering on the voluntary list currently held by the UK Public health Register (UKPHR). The draft Order contains the details of how this regulation will work in practice.
We are asking for views on the draft Order. In particular we are asking about:
- fitness to practice cases
- giving eligible public health specialists time to register with the HCPC
- protection of the title ‘public health specialist’
- impact of public health specialists from a non-medical or dental background being required to register with the HCPC
Update
People have raised concerns about the length of this consultation and the issues it addresses. In particular there are concerns about which organisation should be the regulator. So we have decided:
- to extend the consultation period by 4 weeks, so the consultation will run for 10 weeks and now close on 14th November
- to add 2 questions to the consultation
The new questions are:
Question 1. Do you agree with the Department’s decision that the HCPC should be the statutory regulator for public health specialists from backgrounds other than medicine or dentistry If not, who and why?
Question 2. Do you think that public health specialists should be regulated by another body? If so, who and why?
Documents
Last updated 29 January 2015 + show all updates
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government response to this consultation
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We have extended the date of the consultation and added 2 new questions about who should regulate public health professionals.
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First published.