The British Psychoanalytic Council (BPC) is a professional association, representing the profession of psychoanalytic psychotherapy. The organisation is itself made up of ten member organisations. These member institutions are training institutions, professional associations in their own right and accrediting bodies. Individual psychoanalytic psychotherapists are members of these organisations and are ‘registrants’ of the BPC.
There are around 1200 registrants of the BPC, working across the public, voluntary and private practice sectors. Many of our members are senior consultant psychiatrists, clinical psychologists and leading figures in the field of mental health.
We are a voluntary regulator
One of our functions is to act as a voluntary regulator of the profession. We publish an annual register of those practitioners who meet our fitness to practice standards. This is in line with the recommendations made by the Government’s report The regulation of the non-medical healthcare professions. The report states that the function of a regulator is to:
• Set and promote the standards that all in the profession should meet
• Publish a register of all those who meet these standards
• Ensure that everyone on the register continues to meet the standards (through periodic checks and procedures for resolving concerns/complaints).
The BPC accredits the trainings of its member organisations, ensuring that they meet our minimum training standards. An individual who qualifies from one of these trainings is then eligible for entry into the BPC’s register.
BPC registration is governed by a range of fitness to practice requirements. Failure to meet these requirements will mean that the practitioner’s registration will be suspended or terminated. Our over-riding priority is to protect the public and maintain public confidence in the profession we regulate.
We are a leading voice of the profession
The BPC acts as a leading voice for the psychodynamic and psychoanalytic sector of psychotherapy. Whilst not the only representatives of this sector, we are seen as an authoritative and influential ambassador for this therapeutic approach, at the same time as working in close partnership with other representative organisations such as the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy, United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy, British Psychological Society and others.
We are a service to the public and our profession
Finally, our role is to provide a service both to members of the public and to our profession.
Explore our website at www.psychoanalytic-council.org
