You may never have heard of the BACP – that’s ok – unless you’re a counsellor or therapist you aren’t necessarily likely to have heard of them.

Both Counselling and Psychotherapy in the UK are unregulated professions and the titles are not protected – this means that essentially anyone can call themselves a counsellor or psychotherapist and offer therapy to individuals and groups and those in couples (or multi-person relationships).  Whilst I actually support it not being regulated as a medical model and remain a more humanistic profession, it can be a worry because without proper training and assessment, people could be offered therapy that isn’t legitimate, appropriate, or ethical by someone who hasn’t been trained properly or gained appropriate experience.

To help manage this there are a number of “Professional Member Organisations” that appropriately trained counsellors and therapists can join when they meet the required level of training/qualifications.  There organisations provide most importantly an ethical framework for their members to follow and a complaints procedure for clients to use.  Once appropriately qualified a counsellor may apply to become a member of their chosen Professional Member Organisation and are often offered support, training opportunities, further levels of accreditation and marketing opportunities.  It is also most often a requirement of any Professional Indemnity Insurance policy that the therapist is a member of an appropriate PMO.

There are quite a few Professional Membership Organisations for the counselling and psychotherapy profession in the UK and those organisations vary in quality and usefulness too.  To aid counsellors in choosing an appropriate Professional Member Organisation and in turn help clients know that their [potential] counsellor is of appropriate training, qualification and follows an appropriate ethical framework there is the Professional Standards Authority.

Whilst the list of Professional Standards Authority approved PMO’s is actually quite long there are popular choices.  I chose the National Counselling Society (NCS) when I qualified (now called the National Counselling and Psychotherapy Society NCPS) because I really like their values and ethical framework. (I am no longer a member since I am no longer UK resident and am seeing clients outside the UK)

Many counsellors believe they MUST join the BACP (British Association for Counsellors and Psychotherapists) but this is misinformation.  Misinformation that has been shared prolifically over the years.  In fact I too thought it was the ONLY PMO to join before I researched it more thoroughly.  For years NHS jobs required BACP membership which was possibly due to the misinformation but certainly strengthened it further.

I should say at this point that many fantastic counsellors and psychotherapists are registered with the BACP and my choice and feelings about the BACP are not a reflection of those professionals at all.

So – why didn’t I join the BACP?

My big number 1 reason is that at the time and for some time since their stance on many LGBTQI+ issues were NOT OK in mine and others’ opinion.  Back in 2015 there was a Memorandum of Understanding regarding Conversion Therapy in the UK.  At the time that it was distributed the BACP dragged their feet in signing it, where other organisations were rightly quick to support and action it.  This caused some upset among LGBTQI+ friendly mental health organisations and led to key figures like Dominic Davies of Pink Therapy (a former Fellow of the BACP) to rip up his fellowship and leave the BACP, moving to the NCS as a more forward thinking and diversity inclusive organisation.

A few years later I was delighted when the BACP seemingly upped their game and enlisted Meg John Barker PhD, leading author, researcher and activist for Gender and Sexual Diversity to write “Good Practice across the Counselling Professions: Gender, Sexual and Relationship Diversity” as a guide for therapists.  I was however, then bitterly disappointed that they showed a lack of understanding for the topics it covered when they easily bent to pressure from anti-trans activists and pulled the guide for revision shortly after it was released.  Whilst it was republished after revision the message was damaging and for me confirmed their uncomfortableness in supporting gender diversity issues.

My second major peev with the BACP is their efforts to monopolise the profession.  By propagating misinformation about membership and qualification requirements of the practice and the profession and also overly monetising the pathways to conform to their own self-appointed requirements. By more forceful means circa 2017/18 when they first created the Scoped Project, which was essentially trying to push out all other professional member organisations and for BACP, UKCP and BCP alone to determine and control the competencies and training/practice standards for the profession.  Rightly so there was push-back from the NCS and other organisations and the Scoped project was forced to become more inclusive to other approved PMO’s.

I see now that the BACP are being negative about the use of Psychedelics in therapy, which as a model is gaining traction and bringing hugely favourable results and relief to many people.  I have to be honest when I say it feels like the BACP is dead set upon values that are outdated and rather backward thinking.

When I joined the NCS after qualification and still today when I look at the (now NCPS) website – pretty much everything they stand for warms my heart and aligns with my values.  They have made mistakes but they own them and are very quick to listen, respond and make changes.  If I was still a UK resident I would absolutely still be a member.  I still follow their ethical framework and support them as an organisation.

Now that I live in France and am seeing clients who are not UK resident it makes more sense for me to belong to an International membership organisation and after some research have chosen the International Institute for Complimentary Therapies, which covers all of the EU (among other global areas) and multiple modalities including counselling and nature-based therapies.  It is also supported by Professional Insurances.