asked Her Majesty's Government:

What is their assessment of the extent to which their proposal to place the regulation of the psychological professions under the Health Professions Council will be more successful than the proposal by nine professional bodies representing psychologists to establish a psychological professions council. [HL327]

The Government set out their proposals for the statutory regulation of applied psychologists in their March 2005 public consultation document, Applied Psychology—Enhancing Public Protection: Proposals for the Statutory Regulation of Applied Psychologists. More recently, the department held a four-month period of consultation on our proposals to reform the regulation of medical and non-medical healthcare professionals, following the recommendations made by Sir Liam Donaldson and the advisory group headed by Andrew Foster earlier this year. This consultation ended on 10 November 2006. We are now considering the way forward in the light of responses and the Government's policy objectives. We expect to publish our proposals shortly.