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Not only do veterinary surgeons provide a service to millions of pet owners in the United Kingdom, but they also play a valuable role in maintaining the wellbeing of the country's livestock industry and the protection of public and animal health by acting as sentinels against animal disease outbreaks. It is vitally important that the profession meets modern day standards of quality of service, and has the transparent and accountable disciplinary procedures demanded by the public.
This Report is principally about the governance, structure and accountability of the veterinary profession as conferred by the Veterinary Surgeons Act 1966, and the arguments for and against the need for the Act to be updated. This Report does not seek to be a comprehensive account of the entire work of the profession nor does it sit in judgment on the many ways in which healing services can be administered to animals.
The profession is regulated under the Veterinary Surgeons Act 1966. There appears to be general agreement, within the profession and beyond, that aspects of the Act require modernisation. However, whilst there is consensus that the disciplinary procedure is in urgent need of updating, the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons does not have the support of the majority of the profession for its proposals on compulsory practice standards and compulsory continuing professional development. Despite working for almost five years on the subject, the Royal College has not yet formulated a detailed plan for how a new Council might be structured. Nor is there a clear vision of how "para-professionals" and those administering complementary and alternative therapies to animals ought to be regulated under a new Act.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs agrees that the Act is in urgent need of updating, but has said that there is no funding available for work on a White Paper until at least 2011. These next three years must be used by the profession as an opportunity to decide what it wants, and to iron out internal differences, if it is to have influence on the shape of future legislation. An important step in this process would be for the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons to analyse the costs of its proposals both for those practising and for the consumer. Any new Act should not overload the profession with unnecessary legislation, but it must safeguard the health and welfare of animals and also protect them, and their owners, from those who offer potentially dangerous treatments without sufficient knowledge or training.
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