Author: AdminBPSWatch

Academic freedom and censorship, Gender, Governance

David Pilgrim’s ‘disappearing’ article

AdminBPSWatch

This is the article referred to in David’s previous post which was agreed for publication in DCP Forum (March 2020) but spiked by BPS office. We would also point you to a post also addressing issues of freedom of expression which did ‘not make the cut’, in that case, for The Psychologist.

GIVING AND TAKING OFFENCE

David Pilgrim

Recently clinical psychologists have reported their views on giving and receiving offence and how they might be managed within the profession. This topic reflects a wider historical ethical debate about freedom of expression in speech and writing. The traditional liberal guidance of J.S. Mill is outlined, followed by a discussion of fresh norms about diversity within identity politics, since the ‘postmodern turn’ in the 1980s. It is argued that the wisdom of the first position is being undermined by the latter and that newer well-meant libertarian intentions have culminated at times in authoritarian outcomes.

Over the past year, two seemingly unrelated controversies within British clinical psychology have emerged. The first I was part of (about transgender) and the second I was not (the slavery presentation in Liverpool at the group of trainers’ conference). Both encouraged substantial and illuminating correspondence in these pages. The topics were seemingly unrelated but what linked them was the matter of personal offence and how it could, or should, be managed in the profession. 

In my original piece on sex and gender (Clinical Psychology Forum 319) I was not only pleased that the editor published the piece but also that he then welcomed correspondence, whether it was supportive or critical. I was less pleased by efforts on the part of some to explore the threat of litigation in an effort to constrain serious debate about an important public policy matter and the BPS played its role in this regard. For example, material was deliberately delayed for publication and the editor was instructed to print a letter of complaint sent to the BPS and he was found lacking for not making clear that my view in the original piece was not that of either the Society or the DCP. (Please take the same clichéd disclaimer into account for this piece as well.)

Arguably this was a storm in a teacup: eventually people said what they wanted to say. For now freedom of expression was preserved. It was though under threat, raising the question of why we are bothered about it at all. After all, in the era of social media everyone is free to say anything they want apparently. However, the counter to the latter view is that de facto censorship in a new guise has emerged with the ‘post-truth’ society, where asserted personal opinion, fantasy and jettisoned cautions surrounding academic knowledge all mix in the same social media porridge.  Now, more than ever, the matter of freedom of expression is important for the sake of both academic integrity and social justice in any society claiming to be democratic.

Liberalism and democracy

John Stuart Mill in his essay On Liberty (Mill, 1859/1974) argued that we must be free to express ourselves and we must be tolerant of views and those expressing them, even if we find both disagreeable. His advice was not absolute though; he offered two caveats. First, with freedom comes responsibility. This means that we might do our best to be considerate about the impact of our expressed views. If we are reckless, then it might be gratuitously hurtful and so this should be weighed in the balance by any responsible speaker or writer. 

That weighing up process is context-bound and so neat strictures to guide its success are hard to come by, but it does bring into play the question of intention. On the one hand there might be the regrettable mistake and the complexities of its conscious and unconscious elements; hence the discussion of the need to consider ‘whiteness’ by well-meaning white people in the contention I noted above at the trainers’ meeting. On the other hand there can be the deliberate expression of hateful or disparaging spite for others. The Nazis cast the Jews at every opportunity as being ‘vermin’ and we now know that if people are depicted as being sub-human, then that readily warrants their physical violation (Vicki et al.  2013). This large gap between an error of judgment and knowing hatred and all stops in between is what makes the definition of ‘hate speech’ so difficult. It might be defined as anything that causes offence and so the criterion of ‘hurt’ is relevant but not definitive. For those in the Abrahamic traditions any expressed contempt for God is blasphemy (and so is experienced as hurtful and might evoke reactive anger) but for the convinced atheist it is just fair comment, whether or not it is intended to offend others.   

Mill’s second caveat about restraint is therefore more certain: freedom of expression may encourage or legitimises actual violence against others. He was alluding to the difference between hard and soft power. The rhyme learned in childhood that, ‘Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me’ is flawed because Mill in his first caution conceded that words can be indeed be hurtful. The question today is whether that outcome is the necessary and sufficient condition for suppressing or punishing freedom of expression. A much stronger claim for restraint applies under his second caveat about the encouragement of violence. When violence actually occurs, his point is proven.

Well over a hundred years after Mill’s defence of freedom of expression with its caveats, we are in the midst of a paradox: newer currents of political philosophy have emphasised a form of libertarianism, which is somewhat different from his classic liberalism. Below I argue that this has culminated not in protected freedom but dogmatic intolerance. Like the well-meaning white person not reflecting on their whiteness, the well-meaning new libertarian defending diversity may end up failing in their good intentions to such a degree that an opposite or different outcome accrues. 

Distinctions and dilemmas 

When we come to reflect on the tension between Mill’s liberalism and more recent arguments, we can start with two distinctions. These may mingle confusingly at times in both serious academic debates and in daily puerile social media exchanges. When this blurring occurs, more heat than light might be generated, as protagonists on all sides are caught up in the common experience of swelling righteous indignation, despite holding completely opposing views.  For clarity then we can note:

1 the distinction between an offensive view and the person expressing it: the challenge of ad hominem logic and; 

2 the distinction between identifying offensive views and identifying effective ways of reducing or eliminating those views: the challenge of the pragmatics of the social control of offence to others.

The first of these once was very clear cut and it guided all academic discourse; we learned that we should always ‘play the ball and not the man’ (apologies for the legacy of sexism here). The adage seems to have now been abandoned, with the rise of a different ethical orientation since the ‘postmodern turn’ of the 1980s. That emerged from, and was underpinned by, the cross-currents of post-structuralism, Third Wave feminism and Queer Theory, as well as their direct political expression in our now taken for granted identity politics. This constellation reflected the ‘perspectivism’ of the idealist philosophical tradition, traceable in modern times to Nietzsche, and the rejection of a realist stance on ontology, with its focus on truths and facts. 

Today the distinction between a view (offensive or otherwise) and the speaker or writer holding that view no longer exists in the minds of many. More than that, it is one’s social group membership or social position that might be taken to singularly determine the legitimacy or illegitimacy of one’s view. It is not the virtue, cogency or empirical validity of what is being expressed. If a speaker or writer is deemed to be in a state of privilege, then this may then warrant dismissing anything they are saying. The postmodern turn has installed a new version of political and ethical legitimacy, epistemological privilege, which emerges from the ‘lived experience’ of some people and not others. 

For example, in the contention about transgender, a ‘cis person’ arguing that sex is not socially constructed, or that the obligation to affirm a child’s self-definition of their gender could expose them to iatrogenic risk, might be dismissed immediately as being transphobic and illegitimate, not because of the quality of their arguments and the evidence offered but because they are not themselves transgender. The neologism of ‘cis’ was only made possible because of this new postmodern logic (Sigush, 1998) and in turn this has led in academic research to a confusing conflation of sex and gender, when describing subjects or participants (Haig, 2004). ‘Cis’ is only meaningful to those who invented it (and those who are now accepting of its validity). This may cause offence to those (natal women in particular) who resent being cast as less worthy in their view about being a woman than the view of a transwoman.  For now the NHS has retained an ambivalent policy, with both biological sex and self-identified gender being noted, making record keeping challenging (Dahlen, 2020; https://medium.com/@anneharperwright/sex-gender). Some forms of pathology are unambiguously sex-linked (e.g. cervical and prostate cancer) and so this is important to recognise as a material reality informing decisions about prevention, diagnosis and disease management in health services. 

Turning to attempts to socially control offensive views, this has included appeals to legalism and codes of practice to ensure the prevention of hurt, not just violence, rendering Mill’s views on liberty precarious. There has been a ‘cancel culture’ in which those in the public eye expressing unpopular views are attacked and their reputation discarded. There has been direct action from protesters on our campuses (‘no platforming’). There have been acts of violence or potential violence from trans activists, such as bomb threats to women’s meetings discussing sex and gender. There have been gender critical views on social media being deemed as hate speech, warranting police investigation. There has been professional guidance issued that implies that gender critical arguments, or those respecting traditional scientific assumptions about mammalian sexual dimorphism, reflect a form of ethical deficit on the part of any psychologist holding such views. 

If this point is in doubt then the reader can consult the relevant guidance issued last year on ‘gender, sexuality and relationship diversity’ (BPS, 2019). The guilt or fear from a psychologist about their views on sex and gender, which to date have been ‘off message’, according to the guidance, invite new forms of compliance or anxious restraint in speaking out about their concerns.  The document focuses on the habitual obligation to affirm gender self-identification, in accordance with the ideological roots of the postmodern turn I noted above. Counter-views or scepticism from those not under its sway, whether they are philosophical realists, concerned clinicians working with children or gender critical feminists, are rendered ethically suspect and, not surprisingly, their views are absent from the document. 

The effective social control of experienced offence is not easy to achieve. In this case, the core stricture in the document, is about the intersubjective subtleties of respect for and belief in what others say about themselves. But why in social interactions should we always uncritically trust the self-statements of others? For example, we might consider the person to be mistaken, lying or even deluded. These options are the bread and butter of our daily social contract with others. 

Even when less ambiguous blanket moralisations have been raised to well-intentioned legal powers, their effectiveness has been in doubt. For example, the expression of Nazi ideology is proscribed in Germany. Holocaust deniers have been imprisoned and Nazi symbols are banned but the far right has not only survived with a swagger, it once again is on the rise. Thus legal measures do not eliminate prejudice and the hatred of others, even if they may have a contributory role in raising awareness about them. Even the latter is difficult to determine empirically in open social systems, with so many other processes at play. 

The use of the law is not only a blunt instrument for the social control of offence, it can also lead to precarious outcomes. For example, Deborah Lipstadt accused the ultra-right wing historian, David Irving, of holocaust denial in her widely read book (Lipstadt, 1994). Irving then sued her for libel but he was unsuccessful. However, as Warburton (2009) notes, Lipstadt needed the principled support and substantial financing of her international publisher, Penguin, to rebut Irving, whereas others may have been less fortuitous in having such resources. What secured the truth about the holocaust was not the law (in this case of libel) but freedom of expression (n.b Lipstadt’s, not Irving’s). For Lipstadt, the systematic murder of six million European Jews was not just another ‘perspective’ but simply the truth (n.b. no speech marks) that deserved a clear verification. That truth had to be (re)established by the free pursuit of unfettered intellectual inquiry, including viewpoints being expressed along the way from Lipstadt.  

If legal means of social control of hateful bigotry are not failsafe, then non-legalistic forms of influence may have some impact, without compromising the principle of freedom of expression. Satire and other forms of humour against bigotry actively use that principle in order to make the point. Also, the primary socialisation that encourages sensitivity about respect for all human beings and their diverse viewpoints might be altered within families and schools. All this being said, at all times freedom of expression will still be at risk. It is a fragile principle, no more so than when one party in a field of contention seeks to enforce their own particular version of expression and to suppress others. 

My own view is that the BPS Guidance document I note above has been captured by that newly emergent tendency to enforce a principle of singularity of viewpoint. This trend has deliberately discarded older traditions, about the rehearsal of competing viewpoints, which eschewed ad hominem reasoning. Now to simply discuss a sceptical position about trans-affirmative ideology and more importantly to defend the right to discuss it renders the dissenter ethically inferior (which is possible but is not a given) and their view as requiring no logical or empirical rebuttal (which is absurd because it is required). Within this new norm, open-ended diversity is liberally encouraged and celebrated as being virtuous except in cases where views are disapproved of by those promoting that diversity (Benn Michaels, 2006). 

These new libertarians have thereby become authoritarians at the blink of an eye. Their lack of ethical plausibility is not just that they are authoritarian wolves in libertarian sheep’s clothing but also they expose the ultimate failure of identity politics to provide us with clear guidance on the meaning of social justice. Once diversity displaces or trumps equality it becomes a zero sum game, when the experientially-derived rights of transgender people are asserted against those of natal women who are their gender critical opponents, objecting to the second class citizen connotation of the term ‘cis’. How does anyone decide which epistemological privilege is superior to the other in this stand off?

For those less familiar with academic discussions of healthcare ethics, other relevant case studies can be noted. Some topics have been actively and freely debated (e.g. abortion and the de-pathologisation of homosexuality), whereas others temporarily have taken on a taboo status. One was the consideration on medical grounds for infanticide by Giubilini and Minerva (2013).  This led to some ethicists defending not the arguments made by these authors but their right to make those arguments, returning us to Mill’s axiom (Shackel, 2013).  

Conclusion

I think we are now at a cross-roads. The ethical questions about transgender and healthcare may be suppressed because for now the topic has been afforded a taboo status by the new libertarians I have discussed. Alternatively, we can insist on our right to explore those questions fully and responsibly and without fear of recriminations. That would mean permitting freely expressed views that do not disparage individuals, whatever their perspective and whether they are ‘trans’ or ‘cis, but which instead attends carefully to logic and the evidence available about the topic in contention. Ultimately blanket moralisations in human affairs, whether or not they are codified in laws or ethical strictures will fail to work in practice, so we may as well concede this point and agree instead on the defence of a frank, respectful and, of most importance, non-violent exchange.  

Finally, we can note that the conflation of views and those holding them has a double and limiting significance, because it restricts the topic under discussion to the personal alone. The person giving the offence and those receiving it are certainly part of the socio-ethical picture here, but they are not the whole picture. The content of their claims should also be open to respectful democratic scrutiny and debate.  That can only happen if first we all understand why freedom of expression must be defended in principle, provided its caveats and their impact fully considered. We may then be moved to uphold that defence in practice, in the face of likely criticism and censorious pressures.

References  

Benn Michaels, W. (2006) The Trouble with Diversity: How We Learned to Love Identity and Ignore Inequality New York: Holt.

BPS (2019) Guidelines for Psychologists Working with Gender, Sexuality and Relationship Diversity Leicester: British Psychological Society.

Dahlen, S. (2020): De-sexing the medical record? An examination of sex versus gender identity in the General Medical Council’s trans healthcare ethical advice, The New Bioethics DOI: 10.1080/20502877.2020.1720429

Giubilini, A. and Minerva,  F. (2013) After-birth abortion: why should the baby live? Journal of Medical Ethics 39:261–3

Haig, D. (2004) The inexorable rise of gender and the decline of sex: social change in academic titles, 1945–2001. Archives of Sexual Behavior 33:87-96.

Lipstadt, D. (1994) Denying the Holocaust: The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory Harmondsworth: Penguin

Mill, J.S. (1859) On Liberty (Published in Penguin edition, 1974) Harmondsworth: Penguin.

Vicki, G.T., Osgood, D. and Phillips, S. (2013) Dehumanization and self-reported proclivity to torture prisoners of war. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 49, 3, 325-332. 

Shackel, N. (2013) The fragility of freedom of speech. Journal of Medical Ethics 39: 5.

Sigush, V. (1998). The neosexual revolution. Archives of Sexual Behavior. 27, 4, 331-359

Warburton, N. (2009) Free Speech: A Very Short Introduction Oxford: Oxford University Press.

"The Psychologist", Memory and the Law Group

The Psychologist – a cautionary tale

AdminBPSWatch

Peter Harvey writes….

Whilst we hope that this blog will get very wide coverage, we are realistic enough to know that it hasn’t (as yet, at least) the coverage of the BPS house publication (apparently it’s not a journal, it’s a magazine).  In order to alert the wider membership both to both the fact of the BPS’s decision not to rewrite and/or publish new Memory and Law guidelines and the process as to how this decision was made, I submitted my previous post as a letter to the editor of The Psychologist. He decided not to publish it on the following grounds

  1. It was too lengthy;
  2. I had already had a fairly full response to my queries;
  3. The members of the task force are happy with agreed way forward;
  4. The topic has been covered quite a lot over the years;
  5. When the planned journal coverage appears there might be another opportunity to cover this.

My response is below

Dear Jon,

Unsurprisingly, I am extremely disappointed by your decision not to publish my letter particularly on the grounds of length and the fact that I have already had a response.

Am I to understand that the only criticisms of the BPS that you will allow have to be squeezed into an arbitrary 600-word limit? Whilst the social-media savvy might think that you can have a reasoned and sensible debate with a packaged pullquote or 280 characters, I am of the generation that believes that serious issues demand proper space for debate. Such restrictions shut down argument, make point-scoring the aim rather than having to justify a position by evidence and reason.

The whole point of my letter was that the so-called ‘..fairly full response…” raised important issues of which neither I nor the membership were aware. My initial set of questions were simply that – to ascertain what the Society’s position on the matter is so that I was not reliant on hearsay and rumour. Once I had that information then I could comment sensibly and at proper length.

I find Debra’s statement regarding enquiries to the BPS astonishing – the point I make in the letter. It is outrageous that the Society is not being proactive here. These are guidelines that are in wide circulation still (the 2008 version is still the first hit on a Google search) and many professionals will regard them as current as there is nothing to say otherwise. Do you really expect that prior to using a set of BPS Guidelines everyone will phone the office to check on their currency?

You make the statement that you have covered the issue quite a lot over the years – of course you have and rightly, because it is a critically important issue and remains so. Are you seriously suggesting that in your editorial decision-making you are using the longevity of an issue or debate as a reason for not publishing? Does it not occur to you that one of the reasons that issues such as these command coverage on a regular basis is their importance? I find this an entirely uncompelling argument for refusing to publish.

Awaiting the decision on the proposed journal coverage simply adds further delay and uncertainty into the process. It parallels the BPS’s serious error of judgement in regards to the Keira Bell/Tavistock Judicial Review when the Society – rather than telling its members to obey the law as it now stands – has prevaricated on the basis that the decision is being appealed. Waiting on the unknown outcomes of the decisions of others is surely not a tenable position for a learned society.

The fact that this has appeared on the blog is not the issue – The Psychologist is the BPS house publication to which all members have access. The information contained in my letter has relevance to a significant proportion of that membership.  It gives them information they have a right to know and, in an open organisation, the opportunity to contest and debate.

I am unconvinced that The Psychologist actually functions, as you suggest, as the place to question the Society and its actions. One reason for starting the blog was that we have heard too many members’  experiences of the BPS and The Psychologist being unresponsive to their concerns and to healthy conflict and controversy.  And we will continue to act as forum for questioning the society until it is seen to be acting in the open and transparent manner that it claims to do.

I really don’t want to play the Aggrieved Author here but I find it dispiriting that the main forum for members to have an open debate – our house magazine/journal/publication – is so difficult to have access to. Article too long – really? Just over 2000 words in a 70 page publication. Too familiar – really?  Since when did the study of memory stop being of interest? When was it reported that the Guidelines were archived? What did a recent submission on issues around freedom of expression have to do to “make the cut” to appear? This is our publication for the membership – please give us a chance to use it fully.

Memory and the Law Group

Memory and the Law – a dereliction of duty – Part 2.

AdminBPSWatch

Peter Harvey posts…

After a nudge –  I had no acknowledgement of my email from any of the recipients – a response was received from the BPS Director of Knowledge and Insight [sic]. This confirmed the fact that the Group has been disbanded and that the reason for this was that “…the standards of evidence for the report and the need for consensus and a convergence of evidence from experimental work and clinical practice, as defined within the Terms of Reference for the group, could not be met.”.  In response to my query about informing the wider membership I was told “…To date, we have only received two enquires about this issue, including your enquiry, so we have not disseminated a wider statement to members.”. As to any future plans for providing advice to the many professionals (both within psychology and the law) who will need coherent and learned guidance from the one organisation that is in a position to provide it, they will have to access “… a special issue of a relevant journal…” because, rather than reconstitute the group (or even start over or work towards resolving the conflicts) group members are being asked to “…work on a series of articles about memory-based evidence for a special issue of a relevant journal. This would allow for a full and definitive review of the “state of the art” of different aspects of evidence-based memory and allow the space to outline where there were controversies as well as clear consensus.”.  This decision was reached after “… a  constructive and helpful meeting…in January 2021 although the decision to end the work of the group ‘… was made by the Research Board in October 2020.”.

I leave the reader to draw their own conclusions from this, but I for one, believe this to be an extremely serious error of judgement in the BPS’s part and shows an egregious lack of both moral and ethical responsibility.  What follows is my response, sent to the President, Chairs of both the Research and Practice Boards, and the Director of Knowledge and Insight.

Your response leaves me deeply unsatisfied and raises many questions. I preface these observations by emphasising that as a retired clinical health psychologist I have no current involvement in practice or in court work and I have no special interest or involvement in any pressure group. I am interested solely in the integrity and the reputation of the BPS.

  1. The BPS is in a unique position.

There is no other professional or academic organisation in the UK that is better placed to provide an informed evidence-based overview of research in human memory and how it relates to behaviour, both in a laboratory setting and in real-world contexts. No other academic or applied discipline has the historical and current underpinning of research nor does any other professional organisation have such ready access to the wide range of practitioners for whom an informed understanding of human memory is a core element of their practice. Most importantly, psychologists have developed over-arching and integrative models of memory and its various components that allow for the multiplicity of data to be placed within an explanatory framework. This is not to say that others have nothing to say and that their individual knowledge bases, perspectives and experiences are invalid or in way lesser. But psychologists are in the unique position of being able to integrate and synthesise this vast and disparate scholarship and expertise. That is both our gift and our responsibility.

2.  The BPS has a public responsibility.

Under our Charter and Statues we have a set of public responsibilities 

“…to promote the advancement and diffusion of a knowledge of psychology pure and applied…” (Royal Charter, extract from para 3).

It could be argued that the interface between the law and the discipline and profession of psychology is amongst the most important. In the arena of the courtroom, life-and-death decisions are made on the basis of attempts to understand the complexities of human behaviour.  We have a responsibility (statutory, moral and ethical)  to ensure that all those involved in the real-life process of making informed decisions have access to the best possible evidence and data – however incomplete that may be. We cannot renege on that responsibility nor should we.  By refusing to update our guidelines we are abrogating our critical role in providing support and guidance to those who both need it and to which they are entitled.

3.  “Let them read the Journal.”

It is, frankly, astonishing that the fallback position is that the group will “…work on a series of articles about memory-based evidence for a special issue of a relevant journal. This would allow for a full and definitive review of the “state of the art” of different aspects of evidence-based memory and allow the space to outline where there were controversies as well as clear consensus.”. Apart from the inevitable delay that this process will involve it is simply the wrong decision. These data are, one assumes, already out there in the various academic journals – the “new” papers will be summaries of the existing literature brought together under one roof, as it were. Why spent time and energy on re-inventing the wheel? If this were to seen as an acceptable strategy, then why not simply ask the group for an up-to-date list of papers with references and send this out to interested parties?  And what is missing from this piecemeal approach is the integration of these data into explanatory models. The aims and purposes (amongst others) of a document including the word ‘Guidelines’  under the imprimatur of an organisation are to provide (i)a set of standards for currently acceptable practice; (ii) a summary of current knowledge in the field, identifying what is known, what is uncertain (and possibly, what is wrong) together with informed guidance as to the reliability and limitations of these data. It is this latter function that may be of more importance in this case. In the highly contentious area that involves memories of childhood trauma, courts need the best possible information in order to ensure justice is done fairly and equitably for all those involved. By making access to such information significantly more difficult and without the benefit an expert, informed overview, the BPS is actively depriving people of justice. The other, highly significant problem with the BPS’s so-called solution, is that it removes the authority that the organisation gives to a document. If we take your ‘solution’ then what is there to stop stop a variety of ‘expert’ witnesses quoting from a whole range of journals – the status of which is likely to be opaque to the courts (does publication in the BJP trump the JEP?), leaving laypersons in the unenviable position of having to rate the merits of different scientific papers. What seems to have eluded those who made this decisions is that this is not some cosy academic debate in the conference hall – it impacts on people’s lives in a highly significant way.

4.  On the lack of consensus.

Why is consensus critical? I am not sure that any area of science in general and psychology in particular is reducible to a simplistic, definitive, absolutist position that would claim to have everyone’s agreement. No scientific debate is ever closed.  No reputable scientist would say that a debate is shut, that there is no debate to be had anymore. There will always room for doubt and all our knowledge is only ever provisional, awaiting the next new piece of data or new theoretical insight. Elaborating doubt and controversy is surely a sine qua non of a truly scientific approach to knowledge. In the specific setting of memory and the law I would argue that it is absolutely essential that doubts and controversies are given due prominence so that partial and partisan positions can be exposed for what they are. Giving the courts access to the doubts and uncertainties is surely helpful so that each individual case may be judged on their merits. To quote from the 2008 Guidelines

The guidelines and key points should then be taken as they are intended – as guidelines and not absolute statements. Because they are based on widely agreed and acknowledged scientific findings they provide a far more rigorously informed understanding of human memory than that available from commonly held beliefs. In this respect they give courts a much firmer basis for accurate decision-making.

Citing lack of consensus as reason for winding up a group is cowardly and deceitful and does the BPS irreparable harm. It is shameful.

5.  Conflicts of interest?

I note that the Chair of the 2008 Guidelines was Professor Martin Conway. I also note that he is currently a member of the Advisory Board of the British False Memory Society (BFMS) and I understand that he is regularly called as an Expert Witness. Without in any way impugning Professor Conway’s personal or professional integrity, why did the BPS appoint as Chair, someone who could be put in a position where there might be seen to be a conflict of interest? The BFMS is clearly a pressure group espousing a particular view of how memory works – it cannot be said to neutral. Neither is it a professional body in the sense that the BPS is. Whilst including the views of groups like the BFMS in the Group’s deliberations is appropriate (indeed, excluding such views would also be a serious misjudgement), having someone so closely linked to a particular pressure group as the Chair surely opens the BPS to serious criticism.

6.  The lifespan of guidelines.

I was surprised to find out – despite a long and involved association with the BPS – that there is a policy of archiving guidelines and other documents after a set period of time. Whilst this is clearly a sensible policy for guidance which needs to be updated regularly to reflect changes in knowledge and/or practice, there is an associated responsibility to ensure that all users of such guidance are aware of such a limitation. Nowhere on the original document is there a statement identifying the period for which the guidelines are valid, the process by which they will be reviewed and the implications of using them after their ‘use-by’ date. I would guess that most people will still be regarding these documents as current policy. When I was working I had some considerable experience of NHS guideline development both at a national and local level and it was always made clear that there was a formal, structured and timed review process together with an identified person/post-holder being responsible for that process. Relying on a redeveloped website does not solve this problem. This is passive response which puts the responsibility back onto the user. And it is likely to exclude non-members simply because I would not expect every lawyer to regularly checking up on what is current and what is not. 

7.   Communication with the membership and others.

I find worrying at best and disingenuous at worst to think that the BPS is relying on queries to the office as a means of communicating key policy issues. I have already suggested that most members and users are unaware of the archiving policy in general and the non-applicability of these guidelines in particular. Why would they contact you? This is abrogating a key responsibility of the BPS to keep its members up-to-date and to ensure that those interfaces with the public that rely on our advice are updated as and when necessary. It  is the BPS’s responsibility to be proactive here, both in this case and in general. I am, frankly, astonished by the lack of effort that the BPS has put into keeping the membership up to speed on this matter. Did you inform the membership that the guidelines – containing advice that many practitioners will have need of – were archived and no longer current? If you have, well and good; if not then the BPS has failed in its duty to its members.

8.  Consulting about the decision.

You note that the Research Board decided to disband the Task and Finish Group in October 2020. Clearly, it is within the remit of the Board to make decisions about its own groups. However, the impact of this decision spreads far and wide throughout the Society. Off the top of my head, the Divisions of Clinical, Counselling, Forensic and Neuropsychology have an obvious and immediate interest; I would guess that the Cognitive, Crisis Disaster and Trauma, Developmental, Male, Sexualities, Women and Equalities and Psychotherapy Sections would have more than a passing interest; the Expert Witness Group most certainly would have an opinion. Were they consulted, informed, included at any stage in a decision which has importance for practice? Were the sections that would be able to inform the debate asked for a view? It looks as if the Research Board paid no attention at all to the wider consequences of their decision which has been compounded by the Society’s complete lack of transparency and action in informing the wider membership.

I look forward to hearing what steps the Board of Trustees and the SMG will take to address these issues.

Academic freedom and censorship, Gender, Governance

The Mess We Are In (Revisited).

AdminBPSWatch

David Pilgrim writes…

A few months have now past since my first post. In the most recent edition of The Psychologist, the current President speaks confidently about the need to reduce barriers to our ‘profession’ (sic).  It might seem like a semantic quibble, but the Divisions of the BPS represent forms of profession, but the Sections do not, nor do the open and inclusive Regional Groups. I continue to be a member of both the Division of Clinical Psychology and the History and Philosophy Section, which I recently chaired, and so understand the conceptual distinction in practice.  

Eligibility for the BPS is based upon completing a basic higher education in the discipline of psychology. All professional psychologists are in the discipline of psychology but not all those in the discipline of psychology are professional psychologists. Analogously having a degree in law is a necessary, but not a sufficient, basis for being a professional lawyer. 

I start with this semantic argument not to be pernickety but with a larger agenda in mind. The BPS is allegedly a learned society, overseeing a body of knowledge claiming the disciplinary title of ‘Psychology’. This distinguishes it from other nearby disciplines, such as sociology, philosophy, economics or anthropology, all of which have much to say, quite legitimately, about human experience and conduct. Its charitable status rests upon this assumption of a circumscribed disciplinary authority.

Academic freedom and editorial independence

Many members may not be aware that all the publications produced by the BPS are regulated by its central office and its generally anonymous employees, who are typically not psychologists. Apart from The Psychologist being ‘the magazine of The British Psychological Society’ (words printed every month on its inner cover) its editor is an employee of the Society.  Although the various editors of publications from the Divisions, Sections and Interest Groups are not paid for their work, they must still comply with directives from the BPS office. Copy is checked by the latter and comments and edits made, which may at times over-ride the editorial independence of each. 

Unaware of this simple fact, and maybe with a fingers-crossed blind faith in a learned society unconditionally protecting academic freedom of expression, most members may simply believe the BPS does indeed ensure academic probity. However, as I found out over a year ago (and this was my contribution of a case study sent to the Charity Commission alluded to in my original posting) deliberate decisions are made on a routine basis that over-ride editorial independence. Those are made by unnamed employees of the Society. At times, editors are also instructed to post viewpoints issued by the central office. 

These insights emerged after I had written a piece for the ethics column of the Forum of the Division of Clinical Psychology about the philosophical contestation of sex and gender. This led to interference from the BPS office and the editor being censured after it went into print. The most egregious infringement was when a follow up piece from me was accepted for publication by the editor of the Ethics Column, but it was simply spiked by the BPS office. 

This piece (this, I promise, is true and of course an irony) was about the ethics of freedom of expression, in which I explored some current implications of the legacy of J.S. Mill. At first, I was told by the BPS that it was delayed because of Covid-19. On its continued non-appearance, I made a formal complaint. Eventually, the complaints team told me that it had not been agreed for publication at all because of its poor quality. This raises an intriguing question – what qualifications does the Complaints Team have to judge the academic standard of a scientific paper? Their role is to judge the behaviour of individual members of the Society not the quality of an individual piece of work. As all of us now know, from experiencing a range of frustrated and frustrating complaints, the complaints team is a buffer and shield for decision-makers above them. They pass on messages and rulings and those actually making these decisions, with their tailored and prescribed text, are generally not identifiable. This really is not a fair way for ordinary employees of the Society to be treated by those above them in salary and status. When I asked for further clarification about the decision my email was ignored. 

A full copy of the article will be posted on the blog shortly [Administrator’s note added 07 February 2021 – now available here]. Reporting this experience is neither special pleading nor sour grapes. It is simply an illustration of the failure of the BPS to understand that if it is a learned society, as it claims to be, then it should be obliged to respect academic freedom. If it cannot then it is being hypocritical and not fulfilling the expectations of either its members or the general public. Currently it condones censorship but that is only one of several processes, which we are coming across reflecting an opaque and unaccountable bureaucracy.

Is the BPS acting in the public interest?

Turning to the implications of this for public protection, since we started this blog a few lessons have been learned about the degree of constraint being imposed on academic freedom and the skewing of discourse in favour of some vested interests and not others. Other postings on the blog have highlighted the scandal of the closure of the Law and Memory group.  This is outrageous.  

The current archived report was biased in favour of one experimentalist lobby favouring the False Memory position. Anyone who knows this field now is aware of the evidence of the impact of child sexual abuse upon current and prospective mental health. That clinical and epidemiological research should now be considered fully and in the round, alongside experimental findings, in order to challenge the degree of confidence we might have in trying to extrapolate from the closed system of the laboratory to the open system of human life. For an update see here.

A second example is the complete lack of response in relation to multi-signed letters to the CEO about moves to allow prescribing rights for psychologists and concerns about the highly biased 2019 ‘BPS Guidelines for Psychologists Working with Gender, Sexuality and Relationship Diversity’.  No reply was received to either of these letters and radio silence still prevails today, despite prompts. Is this what a membership organisation, which is supposed to be a learned society, should really look like? Seriously?

A failure to properly advise practitioners?

A final recent example of distorted priorities in BPS publications is the notable appearance, within a day of the game-changing ruling from the Judicial Review on the Kiera Bell case on December 1st 2020, of a defiant piece in The Psychologist. It was not from a BPS member but from a representative of a trans activist organisation, not even from the UK, scorning the new unanimous ruling from the British judges. This piece was very well written and clearly editorially polished over many weeks of collaboration. The editor subsequently confirmed, when asked, that collaboration.

Was this a balanced way of reporting the new legal context, which has been created by the Judicial Review and the international legal precedent it now set? Should The Psychologist, which proclaims itself as ‘The Magazine of the British Psychological Society’, have a duty to comprehensively investigate and report the likely implications of the ruling now for clinical and counselling psychologists?  This is now law – not an opinion – which will remain current until such time as it is changed. 

This casual indifference to the new legal context was mirrored in the half-hearted way in which the BPS itself was content not to bother reviewing immediately its problematic and highly criticised policy on gender noted above. They have parked a re-visit of this document until the appeal hearing of the Judicial Review is heard in March. If the appeal fails (which is highly likely given the December 1st judgment was unanimous), it might then go to the Supreme Court. Will the BPS stall at that point as well, kicking any need for a proper review of this flawed and politicised document well into the long grass?  In the meantime, what advice will it be offering to psychologists working in this highly controversial part of mental healthcare?

Learning points to date

What we have learned in the past few months is the following.

  • Senior members of the Society (elected or unelected) evade accountability by two main methods when approached with concerns from ordinary members.  First, they may simply ignore emails. Second, they may turn pressing concerns about policy matters, implicating public protection, into a complaint to be passed around like a multi-wrapped hot potato in a game of musical chairs. What comes out of that Kafkaesque process, and at what speed, is anyone’s guess, case by case. Whether an outcome even makes sense, common or otherwise, is also important: witness my censored article and the misleading and unfounded rationale for it being spiked. 
  • The Society has no meaningful control over ethical regulation of matters psychological, whether that is in relation to members not on the HCPC register or in relation to the ethics of research. Another irony amongst many is that members may well have received an email recently promoting a course on ethics for psychologists. This is in a context in which those running the Society seem to have lost any appreciation of the meaning of the word for their own conduct and the risks that unaccountable power always entail. Witness their evasiveness and willingness to condone censorship. We will be addressing the role and functioning of the Ethics Committee in future posts.

We can only report what we know in good faith, trying, ever hopeful, to model for the BPS how to ‘do openness’. We do not know why the Finance Director left so suddenly and why this was not reported to the membership publicly, just before Christmas. We do not know why the CEO is not ‘in his office’ and when and if he might return and why ordinary members have had no update on this matter. We do not know if the sham of a Board of Trustees, with its proven conflicts of interests and its lack of outsiders to ensure true public scrutiny, will eventually collapse from its own contradictions. We also do not know what the Charity Commission will do with the information we have supplied to them in our dossier about these serious matters of poor governance. Justice can be slow and maybe slow justice is no justice. However, those contributing to this blog will continue their work, even in the face of being ignored or intimidated. We are not going away.  

Memory and the Law Group

Memory and the Law – a dereliction of duty – Part 1.

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Posted by Peter Harvey

We are going to run a short series of posts concerning the BPS’s recent decision to dissolve the Memory and Law Task and Finish Group. There is a long, complex and controversial history to both the group and issue some of which we will highlight in future posts. The brief background relates to the BPS Memory and the Law reports (2008 and 2010). These are now archived as, according to the BPS “…they are no longer regarded as reflecting the Society’s current position…”. The group set up to review and revise them (presumably in the light of more recent evidence) has now been disbanded because “…it had not delivered the required output within the required timescale and failed to reach a consensus on key proposed elements of the document…”. On hearing the news that the group has now been permanently disbanded, I sent the following email (17 January 2021) to the President, and the Chairs of the Research and Practice Boards:

Dear President,

I understand that that, after its recent suspension, the Memory and the Law Task and Finish Group is to be permanently and formally disbanded. Before I take this matter further I would be grateful for clarification.

1. On whose authority was this decision made? 

2. When will the membership be informed of this decision?

3. What will the membership be told about the reasons for this decision?

4. What does the BPS intend to do about rescinding its previous documents (still in circulation) and advising both practitioners and the wider legal system that the BPS no longer feels able to offer evidence-based guidance on the controversies concerning how scientific research on memory should and should not be used in court?

As you will see I have copied this email to those within the BPS who I believe have an interest in this matter.

I should add that I do not wish you to treat this as a complaint to be channelled though the complaints process. This is matter of policy. I am requesting that you and your senior professional office-holders address this as a matter of urgency.

Yours sincerely,

Peter Harvey AFBsS; member number 5187; former Chair Division of Clinical Psychology; former Chief Examiner and Chair of Board of Examiners BPS Qualification in Clinical Psychology).

Ethics

BPS Ethics Procedures – fit for purpose – 2?

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As a follow-up to my last post I have, at last, been given the name of the current Chair of the BPS Ethics committee. Just for the record, I contacted the BPS Office on 11 December 2020 and got a reply on 5 January 2021. Even allowing for COVID-19, working from home and the “festive” season, this seems an excessive delay. Additionally, I can only contact the Chair via the BPS Office. Below is a copy of the email that I asked to be forwarded:

Dear Dr Paxton,
I am contacting you in your capacity as Chair of the BPS Ethics Committee.
You will be familiar with the controversy surrounding the late Hans Eysenck’s research with Roland Grossarth-Maticek, including the letter to The Psychologist (September 2019) from Colman et al. requesting the the BPS formally investigate. The response from the Society (via an unnamed and unattributable source) effectively bypassed this by handing the responsibility on to his then employers. 
That has now been done and a report published by Kings College (freely available and in the public domain). They concluded that at least 26 studies were “…unsafe…” and contacted the relevant journal editors to inform them of this.
Where does the BPS stand now? A senior and high-profile psychologist of international repute has had parts of his work formally and thoroughly investigated by an independent group and this work has been found unsafe. Surely the BPS owes its members and the wider public some sort of response?
The BPS is ostensibly dedicated
to promote the advancement and diffusion of a knowledge of psychology pure and applied and especially to promote the efficiency and usefulness of Members of the Society by setting up a high standard of professional education and knowledge.and to maintain a Code of Ethics and Conduct for the guidance of Members and to compel the observance of strict rules of professional conduct as a condition of membership;
At a time when science as whole is under such close scrutiny (if not threat) surely we cannot ignore this, hope that it will go away or hide behind some anodyne statement?
I would be grateful if you let me (or, even better, the membership) know what the BPS is planning to do.
Best wishes,
Peter Harvey AFBPsS (former Chair DCP).

As of today (18 January 2012) I have had no response, no acknowledgement, nothing. The title of this post remains apposite.

Peter Harvey.

Ethics

The BPS Ethics procedures – fit for purpose?

AdminBPSWatch

A reaction to Ashley Conway’s post from Peter Harvey:

It is an understatement to say that Hans Eysenck was no stranger to controversy. However, two papers published in 2019 highlighted serious concerns about possible ethical issues  – specifically relating to his work with Ronald Grossarth-Maticek. In his editorial, David Marks includes an open letter to the CEO requesting that the BPS conducts “…a thorough investigation of the facts together with retraction or correction of 61 papers.”. His plea was based on a well-referenced and highly detailed paper published in that same journal by Anthony Pelosi who concluded:

There is a complicated and multi-layered scandal surrounding Hans Eysenck’s work on fatal diseases. In my opinion, it is one of the worst scandals in the history of science, not least because the Heidelberg results have sat in the peer-reviewed literature for nearly three decades while dreadful and detailed allegations have remained uninvestigated. In the meantime, these widely cited studies have had direct and indirect influences on some people’s smoking and lifestyle choices. This means that for an unknown and unknowable number of individual men and women, this programme of research has been a contributory factor in premature illness and death. How can members of the public and their policymakers turn to science for help with difficult decisions when even this most extreme of scientific disputes cannot be resolved?

In a letter to The Psychologist (September 2019), Colman, Marks, McVittie & Smith noted that the BPS is “…uniquely placed to conduct a formal investigation and audit, and we call on them to act as soon as possible.”.

In an anonymous response (i.e. headed ‘Society reply’), after one paragraph describing the Society’s purpose (hopefully already known to its members) and another quoting from the Code of Ethics and Conduct, the third paragraph states:

However, the conduct of research lies with the academic institution which oversees the work carried out by its academics and we welcomed the investigation into this research carried out by King’s College, London.

In May 2019, Kings College reported on its internal enquiry into publications authored by Professor Hans Eysenck with Professor Ronald Grossarth-Maticek. Apart from the laudable speed  and thoroughness with which this was both commissioned and made available in the public domain, its conclusions are of considerable significance:

The Committee shared the concerns made by the critics of this body of work. We have come to the conclusion that we consider the published results of studies that included the results of the analyses of data collected as part of the intervention or observational studies to be unsafe and that the editors of the journals should be informed of our decision. We have highlighted 26 papers (Appendix 1) which were published in 11 journals which are still in existence (see list of journals and editors Appendix 2). We recommend that the Principal write to the editors of these journals to inform them that, based on our enquiry, we consider the results and conclusions of these studies are unsafe.

The Director of Research Governance, Ethics and Integrity at King’s has written to the academic lead for research misconduct at the University of Heidelberg to confirm Professor Ronald Grossarth-Maticek’s affiliation with them at the time in question, and to clarify their procedure for investigating allegations of research misconduct.

So whilst the BPS welcomed the Kings investigation, its serious conclusions and actions seem to have gone unremarked. In a much more detailed analysis of the history of this scandal and the BPS’s lack of action Craig et al., (2020) state, quite unequivocally:

The Eysenck case is a stain on the record of psychology and on science itself.

So what has the BPS done? As far as I can ascertain – absolutely nothing. I have searched the 2019/2020 archive of The Psychologist and there is no record of any statement by the BPS (I am happy to be pointed in the right direction should I have missed it). I am trying to contact the Chair of the BPS Ethics Committee – a task made harder as their name and contact details are absent from the BPS website (I will post as soon as I get a response). However, in attempting to find out about about the complaints procedure I came across the following statement:

In order for the Society to be able to take any action you must provide the evidence required, as outlined in the procedures of the Member Conduct Rules. The Society will then decide if the member has breached the rules, and decide on the appropriate action. The Society does not have a function to investigate complaints against its members, but can take action when the Society has evidence of the outcomes from any appropriate third party investigation.

I was shocked to read that the Society does not have an investigatory function. It is the one body that has access to the expertise necessary to evaluate the validity of an ethical breach. In my opinion it is a serious dereliction of duty to outsource the investigatory process. In this case, that has been done and the review raises serious questions about the integrity of widely-cited research by a very senior psychologist. So why hasn’t the BPS, quickly and authoritatively, responded? Where is the acknowledgement of the Kings Report (initially ‘welcomed’ by the BPS). They have done their duty – why not the BPS? Surely the BPS shouldn’t shirk its responsibilities in this way.

'False Memory Syndrome', Ethics

Does the BPS Care About Ethical Standards Enough to Enforce Them?

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Ashley Conway writes:

Following on from my earlier post –

The Charity Commission says that the BPS must follow the demands of the Royal Charter and Statutes and Rules of the Society. The Royal Charter states:  that the Society should “…maintain a Code of Ethics and Conduct for the guidance of Members and to compel the observance of strict rules of professional conduct as a condition of membership.”.

I believe that this is an area where the BPS completely fails to fulfil its obligations.

About a third of BPS members are also registered with the HCPC, and the BPS is happy to pass on responsibility for dealing with rule violations by them.  But what of the other two thirds of the membership?  The answer seems to be that the BPS does everything it can to avoid taking any responsibility, usually passing the buck to the member’s employer.  But what if they have no employer (i.e. are self-employed?) or their employer uses Non Disclosure Agreements to avoid scandal, as some universities do (see here and here)?  This could mean that ethics violations go unreported and can be repeated by a guilty individual, possibly causing great harm to vulnerable people.

I cannot find anything in either the Charity Commission requirements or the BPS Charter that says that this responsibility about ethical standards can be farmed out to third parties or ignored.

What follows is a specific example of the problem.  Elizabeth Loftus is an Honorary Life Fellow of the BPS who enjoys a high profile internationally, despite considerable controversy.  This, from The Psychologist (July 2011, 24, 490-503):

Star power arrived at the 2011 Annual Conference this year in the form of Elizabeth Loftus (University of California, Irvine), the doyenne of false memory research who’s had the mixed fortune of attracting death threats and the highest academic accolades. 

However, there are, I would suggest, serious ethical questions to be raised about her conduct.

  1. As far back as 1995, complaints were made to the American Psychological Association (APA) against Loftus by Lynn Crook and Jennifer Hoult.  Both have complained that Loftus grossly mis-represented their life stories (see here and here).  Loftus resigned from the APA just before the complaints process was about to be initiated.  There were allegations that she had been tipped off about it, because for both the APA and Loftus, resignation was the best way to avoid the investigation and unwanted publicity.  
  2. She has come in for strong criticism from judges for the nature of her expert witness testimony.  In the case referenced in her TED talk described below, referring to Loftus’s actions in question (Loftus falsely claiming to be a clinician’s supervisor to gain personal information for her use), the court stated  “In our view, intentionally misrepresenting oneself as an associate or colleague of a mental health professional who has a close personal relationship with the person about whom one is seeking information would be a particularly serious type of misrepresentation …” .  In another case Judge John Fedora dismissed Loftus’s opinion as “Having been rendered after an uncritical review of an absurdly incomplete record carefully  dissected to include only pieces of information tending to support Appellant’s repressed memory theory …”.
  3. In her TED talk there is further evidence of possible ethical breaches.  (i) She reveals the name of a victim of abuse who was promised anonymity, when her very personal story was used as a case study by respectable psychologists;  (ii) Loftus states:  “She accused her mother of sexual abuse based on a repressed memory” without informing us that actually the person in question had made revelations of abuse as a little girl, which had videotape and verbatim documentation.  So the accusations were based on much more than an adult’s “repressed memory”, and the truth goes very much against the false memory hypothesis that Loftus is seen to support.  (iii) Loftus states: “I became part of a disturbing trend in America where scientists are being sued for simply speaking out on matters of great public controversy.”.  But the litigation issue was not about speaking out on matters of great public controversy.  The real reason that she was being sued was for  “… for defamation and invasion of privacy…” as she herself reveals in this same talk.
  4. There have been important questions raised over the validity of the data in her famous “lost in the mall” study.

I have raised this issue of Loftus’s behaviour on a number of occasions with the BPS.  This year I wrote to the CEO about this and related issues three times.  I received no reply, which I now know has been the experience of many others.  I did, finally, get something back from a very senior member of the BPS who said “In relation to Prof Loftus, election as an Honorary Life Fellow confers membership of the Society so the member conduct rules would apply, as they do to all members. I would draw your attention to the fact that, since the Society is no longer a regulator, it normally requires ‘allegations to first have been determined using other appropriate procedures’ such as by the appropriate regulatory body.’” I genuinely do not understand this response.  What would be an appropriate procedure and who would be an appropriate body for Loftus?  The complainants above did not find one.  Where in the Charity Commissions rules for the Society, or the Royal Charter, does it say that the Society is no longer a regulator?  If this really means that the BPS takes no responsibility for enforcing its Conduct Rules or Code of Ethics, what is the point in having them?  

And BPS – how does this fit in with the requirement to “… compel the observance of strict rules of professional conduct as a condition of membership.”?  

I think that the BPS owes us all an answer to this question.

Gender

Vexatious?

AdminBPSWatch

David Pilgrim posted

The problematic use of the term ‘vexatious’ by Heather Wood in her comment on my post (26 November), was made prior to the judicial review announcement (December, 1st 2020). Surely the ‘no debate’ position of those supporting the use of puberty blockers for children, with the trajectory that sets for later biomedical interventions, is no longer tenable. It is that notion of ‘no debate’ which reflects a vexatious position. Now psychologists, like others, should be debating this matter publicly and according to standard academic conventions of respect (i.e. avoiding ad hominem reasoning and weighing up evidential and ethical considerations in the round). 

Unfortunately, the parlous state of BPS governance in the past few years has not ensured this needed scenario. Instead the poor consultations about the revised Memorandum of Understanding on conversion therapy (NB the 2017 version, not the original in 2015), the now contested policy on gender and the incipient attempt by some to extend prescribing rights to psychologists (which might include hormones) have left us without a full and democratically deliberated set of policies from the Society. This leaves the acting CEO of the BPS in a difficult position when responding, for example, to the Judicial Review’s announcement. My hope is that people will contribute to this blog with their views on where this leaves us all now in relation to child protection and our work in the NHS. 

Board of Trustees, Governance

BPS – Failures in meeting its charitable obligations?

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David Pilgrim’s piece on this site draws attention to the dysfunctionality of the BPS and raises questions about the constitution of the Board of Trustees.

Here I want to take a closer look at that issue.

The BPS has massive problems with its infrastructure.

The British Psychological Society is a charity, and as such has to abide by certain rules laid down by the Charity Commission.  The Charity Commission website defines the Activities of the BPS  “As specified by the Charter, Statutes and Rules of the Society”.  

The Royal Charter states: “The objects of the Society should be to promote the advancement and diffusion of a knowledge of psychology … setting up a high standard of professional education and knowledge.”. And “To maintain a Code of Ethics and Conduct for the guidance of Members and to compel the observance of strict rules of professional conduct as a condition of membership.” (my emphasis – I believe that the BPS fails dismally in this regard, and I intend to address this issue in a subsequent blog).

The BPS Code of Ethics required by the Royal Charter (3.4 Integrity) states that psychologists should act with integrity which “ … includes being honest, truthful, accurate and consistent in one’s actions, words … Psychologists value honesty, probity, accuracy, clarity and fairness … in all facets of their scientific endeavours.”.  And that there should be “Honesty, openness and candour; Accurate unbiased representation; Fairness; Avoidance of exploitation and conflicts of interest …”.  Rule 1 of the Member Conduct Rules (also required by the Charter) is that “Members must not act in a way that damages, or is likely to damage the reputation of the BPS (or is contrary to the object of the Society as set out in the Royal Charter).”.  

I think that the Society also fails badly in these requirements. How can that happen? 

To answer that question, we need to look at the rules for how charities are governed.

According to the Charity Commission website  (https://www.gov.uk/set-up-a-charity) “Trustees are responsible for the operation of your charity. They must show they understand their legal requirements…. your trustees’ background and experiences can help: bring different points of view to a discussion, give insight into your beneficiaries’ needs and experience, make contacts in the community, think of new ways of doing things.”.  And “As trustees, you have a duty of care to prevent risks to your charity’s reputation as well as the people it helps. As trustees, you must: always act in the best interests of the charity – you must not let your personal interests, views or prejudices affect your conduct as a trustee, act reasonably and responsibly in all matters relating to your charity – act with as much care as if you were dealing with your own affairs, taking advice if you need it, only use your charity’s income and property for the purposes set out in its governing document, make decisions in line with good practice and the rules set by your charity’s governing document, including excluding any trustee who has a conflict of interest from discussions or decision-making on the matter.”. 

This is what is said about “Risks and trustee liability”:  

“You can be liable to your charity if you act unlawfully or negligently as a trustee. Although your charity might run up debts or other liabilities as a result of decisions you make, you and the other trustees won’t be liable if you have:  acted lawfully, responsibly and reasonably, followed the rules in your charity’s governing document, taken reasonable steps to manage risks.  But if you can’t prove this, you could be ‘in breach of trust’ to your own charity. Trustees act jointly when running a charity, so the trustees as a group would be liable to repay any loss to the charity.”.

The Commission can take trustees to court to recover funds lost to their charity as a result of a breach of trust.  (https://www.gov.uk/guidance/trustee-board-people-and-skills?step-by-step-nav=3dd66b86-ce29-4f31-bfa2-a5a18b877f11).

It specifies that there is a “legal duty to act in your charity’s best interests, manage your charity’s resources responsibly and act with reasonable care and skill.”.  And that it is “vital that Trustees deal with conflicts of interest, implement appropriate financial controls, manage risks and take appropriate advice when you need to.”  (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-essential-trustee-what-you-need-to-know-cc3/the-essential-trustee-what-you-need-to-know-what-you-need-to-do).

Now let’s take a look at who are the Trustees for the BPS:  

Statute 18 of The Royal Charter (Royal Charter and Statutes, BPS, 2017) states “The Board of Trustees shall comprise the Officers of the Society and other members … Presidential team, the President and The President elect… The Officers of the Society…. The Honorary Treasurer and Honorary General Secretary. The Board of Trustees shall include the following other members  … The Chairs of the Boards of the Society; At least two and not more than five other members co-opted to the Board in a manner determined by the Representative Council in accordance with the Rules.  The President shall chair all meetings of the Board of Trustees at which he or she is present and in his or her absence the President-Elect or the Vice President.”.

 So, I believe that a huge problem for the BPS is that its Trustees are individuals who are deeply embedded in its operational status quo. The people who are meant to have oversight of the actions of the Society are the same people taking those actions (or in many cases, inactions).   

Their duties are specified: “The Board of Trustees shall conduct the business of the Society consistently with provisions of the Charter and these Statutes and shall supervise the expenditure of all moneys on account of the business of the Society and do all such other things as are necessary for the transaction of the business of the Society and the furtherance of its objects… The Board of Trustees may, from time to time, at their discretion appoint from among their members or otherwise such Committees as shall appear expedient and may, from time to time, modify or dissolve any Committee. Any Committee so appointed shall in exercise of the powers delegated to it conduct its affairs in accordance with such regulations as may be imposed on it by the Board of Trustees.”.

There is also “a representative council which shall advise the Board of Trustees (“the Representative Council”). It will comprise:

(1) The Officers of the Society; the President, Honorary General Secretary, Honorary Treasurer, President-Elect and Vice President;

(2) The Chairs of the Boards of the Society;

(3) A representative from each of the Member Networks approved by the Board of Trustees;

(4) Co-opted Members who shall serve for one year as prescribed in the Rules.”.

So – to summarise – the Trustees, who are meant to impartially have oversight of the functioning of the Society, are the same people who effectively run the Society, and there is also a Representative Council which advises the Trustees, which is mainly the same people again.  So if you include being a member of the Society, many of the Trustees are in quadruple roles (e.g. Member, Chair of a Board, member of the Representative Council and Trustee).

At the time of writing there are 12 Trustees listed on the Charity Commission website, and an additional one on the BPS site.  Of the 13 on the BPS site, 12 have, or have had, senior positions in the BPS system (e.g. Chairs of Boards, Divisions, Sections etc).

How can Trustees in quadruple roles fit in with the demands of the Charity Commission to avoid conflicts of interest?  I believe that avoidance of such a conflict is imperative, and not simply that it is there, but that it is seen to be there.  At the moment it looks exactly the opposite, that the Trustee group is likely to be seen to be full of conflicts of interest.

It appears that the Statutes of the Society regarding Trustees and other roles are such that they are in direct opposition to the requirements of the Charity Commission.  How on earth do you square that circle?

There is a serious and urgent need for the BPS to review this structure, and for it to be clearly seen to be and complying with Charity Commission regulations.

Ashley Conway  1/12/20