More 'openness' from the RCVS

 


RCVS Council meeting January 2025 - Keeping you informed.

'On Thursday, 16 January 2025, we will be holding our first RCVS Council meeting of the year, which will be online.'

Keeping us informed ? Well not exactly Lord Copper, not exactly. Although the College likes to give the impression of openness, with occasional online Council meetings and the farce of regional Question Time time-up-for-question-time the organisation remains as obsessively secretive as ever. Council members are forbidden - under threat of disciplinary action no less - to reveal details of Council meetings. When a Council member was thought to have leaked some information about changes to the disciplinary process, the RCVS commissioned a former senior police officer to interrogate council members in a bid to identify the source (or sources) of the leak. The investigation is believed to have cost tens of thousands of pounds but the RCVS has refused to say how much ... .  (and after all that they didn't find the leak, but the point had been made; as the saying goes, 'the process is the punishment). 

This the sort of crass, heavy handed organisation we are dealing with. If this meeting is online you can bet your bottom dollar nothing of substance will be discussed (generally 30% of all business is concealed from the membership).

The College is already an information black hole and that's while we still have an elected element - if the governing clique get their way and we move to an appointed Council it can only get worse. 

Here's an excerpt from a recent, minimalist, College reply, delivered under the FOIA. More redactions than even the Scottish Government could manage (Nicola Sturgeon would feel right at home with this lot).

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