Legislation to enable ACT to join national scheme for health practitioner registration

ACT Minister for Health, Katy Gallagher MLA, today introduced the ACT Health Practitioner Regulation Bill 2009 into the Legislative Assembly to enable the ACT to join the national scheme for registering and accrediting health professionals.

"Establishing a single scheme will create nationally consistent, rigorous registration and accreditation arrangements and improve public protection through the regulation of health practitioners and students,” Ms Gallagher said.

“Having a national scheme will allow health professionals to move around the country more easily, reduce red tape, improve administrative efficiency and consistency, provide greater safeguards for the public, and promote a more flexible, responsive and sustainable Australian health workforce,” she said.

The national scheme was agreed to in March 2008 by the Council of Australian Governments (COAG).

Ten health professions are to be included in the national system: chiropractors, dental care practitioners, medical practitioners, nurses and midwives, optometrists, osteopaths, pharmacists, physiotherapists, podiatrists, and psychologists. A further four professions will be added to the national scheme in July 2012: Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander health practice, Chinese medicine, medical radiation practice and occupational therapy.

“During the development of the legislation there has been an extensive consultation process involving a series of national and state forums, and engaging health professionals, professional associations, regulatory bodies and the public in the discussions,” Ms Gallagher said.

“I am aware of the significant time and effort registrants and government officials, nationally and locally, have put into getting this right.

“All national systems are the result of negotiation and compromise to reach outcomes acceptable to all jurisdictions and the national law to be adopted by this bill is no different. Practitioners and regulators in the ACT will find some differences in how registration, accreditation and other processes will be managed under the national scheme.

“While the ACT is participating in the national complaints system, the ACT currently has a progressive complaints handling system linking the Health Professions Boards with the ACT Health Services Commissioner and we will retain this.

“The ACT has modified its complaints handling process to retain a joint consideration model between the National boards and the ACT Health Services Commissioner. This is where I believe protection of the public is the paramount consideration,” Ms Gallagher said.

The introduction of the Bill puts the ACT on target to support national introduction of the scheme by 1 July 2010, while in the mean time, the current State and Territory based regulation will continue to apply to registered health practitioners.

10 December 2009