HPC Council meeting, Feb 2009

Yesterday I went to observe the full Council meeting at the HPC. I had set aside the whole day for the occasion, but as most of the day was given over to a strategy work shop and an expansion work shop, the actual business of the group was restricted to 30 minutes at the end of the afternoon. This was the 30 minutes to which the public were admitted. There was one other public obliged to wait in the reception area until the Council were ready to display themselves and we had a few minutes conversation before we were ushered into the only two empty chairs in a very full room, where once more I discovered myself crammed into the corner looking at the back of a row of heads. I was luckier than my colleague - his seat had been soaked by a leak in the air conditioning...

This other member of the public was a young man - an Oxford graduate. Why on earth was he there? I had asked. He works for the CHRE - the official watchdog of the HPC. As part of their remit they like to drop in on the various regulatory bodies under their auspice to see how they are getting on. He asked me why I was there - I had to concede that I was the unofficial watchdog, and as he didn't immediately laugh out loud I launched my manifesto.

I told him I was very worried about the unintended consequences of such a strange invention as the HPC, and indeed the CHRE, come to mention it. He looked amazed. I talked about the centralisation of power and the centralisation of knowledge and the catastrophic consequences this has on the local practice of any profession. He let me continue. I spoke of the collapse of the banking system and pointed to the system of regulation they had been subject to. I drew the comparisons and predicted a similar collapse in the professions subject to it here, due to the inevitable destruction of local knowledge that such a move sets in train. He seemed to be interested, so I risked Popper's Nightmare. Of course he had heard of Karl Popper, but he had not studied his nightmare, so I referred him to the you-tube clip of Richard Gombrich, which is linked to the side-bar of this blog. I seemed to be on firm ground, so I followed it up with encouragement towards Marilyn Strathern and Michael Power, then pressed my advantage by mentioning Mark Neocleous.

Here he rallied and began putting counter arguments.
- Professionals must be regulated - the public think they are already.
- They are, I quickly replied.
- Self regulation? He countered, with a rye smile.
- Yes, of course, said I.
- But that is hardly reliable, the professionals only look after themselves.
- But such a cynical argument also applies to yourself.
- How so?
- The HPC, the CHRE must also look after themselves, attend to their public persona, safeguard their jobs and their future employment, this is just part of life.
- But surely standards of knowledge and performance are necessary to protect the public.
- Yes but how are they produced and policed - we are back at Popper's Nightmare.
- But people need these rules for practice
- Which rules? There are rules generated in the process of practice and discussion within the communities that work on these things, and then there are rules made by centralised committees and constructed by political processes. Then there are rules for practice, questions of ethics, and rules of law. The context is complex, but not so complex that those who work and practice can't attend to them. It is more difficult for people who don't work in the practice to come up with a good set of rules. This question touches on science and politics. Which rules do you mean?

Enter Colin Bendall whose job it is to usher us into the performance.