Being dragged willingly: experience of regulation by the state

During today's meeting of the PLG for C&P one of the group said that she had not wanted to be part of this process, but could see it was happening anyway and thought it was better to join in and to try to influence it, rather than be dragged unwillingly along.

Another member said there was no argument to avoid this process: times had changed, 'that' was history, 'this' is now, it is time for something new. This is new. That's all.

The HPC line is to reduce things to a shorthand: Professionals on the HPC register are safe, it is the others who are not. Then someone will say that professionals were a danger to the public before, and are only being brought under control by the introduction of lay people into their dominion. There is a lot to say here, a lot. But not much is being said in today's climate. There is a caste iron supposition that professionals are dangerous to society, and that lay people on boards and panels are the antidote to that. The force of this argument is quite frightening - it is used as a full stop to any further discussion. It has become a kind of magic bullet. This is the point on which I am focussed. How to uncover the process and mechanism that produces this kind of non-sensical thought. There is no magic bullet. I am more interested in the question: what needs to be done to allow ideas to be discussed and tested so that people can better understand the risks they are asking themselves or other people to take as a consequence.

The difficulty we are now faced with is how to minimise the damage that this twisted logic will cause. Only if we engage in thinking - and think not constrained by fear, nor compelled by brute force - can we hope to get out of this mess.