Vet groups debate Veterinary Surgeons Act at Senedd
RCVS president Sue Paterson said the current Act left a 'huge hole' in veterinary regulation.
Veterinary organisations and charities, including the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS) and the RSPCA, have addressed the Welsh Senedd on the corporatisation of the profession.
In an online meeting, the groups called for a reform of the Veterinary Surgeons Act 1966, which RCVS president Sue Paterson said left a ‘huge hole in the regulatory process’.
Dr Paterson described how, when the Act was introduced, all veterinary practices were owned by veterinary surgeons. She said this meant that, by regulating veterinary surgeons, the Act was effectively regulating the practices themselves.
However, changes made to veterinary ownership in 1999 led to more practices being owned by non-veterinary professionals.
Dr Paterson said that these developments had resulted in the RCVS progressively losing its ability to regulate veterinary practices. As such, even where a decision has been made due to business pressures, the RCVS can only challenge the veterinary professional, and not the practice.
The RCVS president explained that approximately 50 per cent of practices in the UK were owned by one of the seven corporate groups. This was at only a slightly lower rate in Wales, where 41 per cent of practices were corporate-owned.
Dr Paterson said: “We have been working really hard to try and get a new Veterinary Surgeons Act and, so far, our pleas have fallen on deaf ears.
“We're hoping to try to get some leverage over the next 12 to 18 months. We need to modernise our whole regulatory system”
Animal welfare charity RSPCA Cymru, represented by chief veterinary officer Caroline Allen, also criticised the Veterinary Surgeons Act, calling it ‘very, very outdated’.
Dr Allen similarly described how corporate entities held no responsibility for mistakes made in practice, meaning veterinary surgeons had the ‘the worst of both worlds’. She explained how a veterinary surgeons are faced with the dilemma of fulfilling their professional obligations to animals, while also receiving corporate demands from practice owners.
Dr Allen said: “I'm still in touch with a lot of vets who are working in practice, and that is a very real challenge for them, so I think any kind of influence or pressure to bear on a new Veterinary Surgeons Act is definitely something we need.
“It would also allow for veterinary nurses to be able to do much more, and I think there's so much potential there as well. There's a lot that needs fixing.”
The Committee took place before the Competition and Markets Authority announced it would launch a formal market investigation, which further prompted organisations such as the British Veterinary Association to renew their calls for a reformed Veterinary Surgeons Act as part of the investigation.
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