When seeking mental health assistance, there are many reasons to choose an un-regulated practitioner, such as a holistic spiritual counselor, a hypnotherapist, medition or yoga instructor, or a Reiki practitioner, instead of a licensed, regulated practitioner. Some of the most obvious reasons are that unregulated practitioners do not assign life-long, demeaning mental illness diagnoses or prescribe dangerous drugs. One of the not-so-obvious reasons is this: a regulated practitioner might very well share your confidential and personal information without your permission and easily get away with it. Let’s back up for a moment. In the past, we’ve explained that forcing unscientific mental illness diagnoses on patients and clients is unconstitutional and proven damaging to recovery. We shared how a top US Court has found psychology (and by extension psychotherapy) unscientific and psychology/psychotherapy laws unconstitutional. And, we’ve shared that an unconstitutional psychotherapy law in Ontario could become enforceable any day, and that it will give the Ontario psychotherapy College (CRPO) complete control over mental and emotional illness practitioners from spiritual advisors to counselors of all kinds. Now, let’s consider mental health treatment by a CRPO-regulated practitioner. Most clients who choose to consult with a ‘registered psychotherapist’ in Ontario probably assume that their private information will be kept confidential UNLESS they provide written consent to disclose. It’s a reasonable assumption, given that regulation is alleged to protect the public. But it’s no longer the case! The College of Registered Psychotherapists (CRPO) now claims that getting your written consent to disclose your health and treatment information (which will likely include a mental health diagnosis) is too burdensome for its members. So, in June 2016, CRPO passed, during an unrecorded meeting behind closed doors, a draft amendment to their Standards of Confidentiality (see page 5: http://www.crpo.ca/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/June-2316-APPROVED-Council-MINUTES-w.-in-camera-removed.pdf), such that in the future the only requirement for their members will be a note in the practitioner’s file claiming that verbal consent was given, with no proof required whatsoever. In effect, the CRPO is giving its members the ability to decide what confidential health and treatment information to release about you without your knowledge or consent. And in Ontario, more and more emphasis is being placed on regulated medical-model, multi-disciplinary ‘care teams’, which further increases the likelihood of information being improperly, excessively and unnecessarily shared. Thus, there will be NO reliable protection of personal information whatsoever, leaving clients’ information wide open to abuse. Should a client discover a breach of trust, the CRPO member need only point to their handy note claiming that verbal consent was granted at some point in the past. It will be the word of the ‘mental health patient’ against the word of the ‘licensed mental health expert’. This gives full discretion to regulated psychotherapists to share private information with whomever they feel ‘needs’ it, without the client’s knowledge or written consent. This is inherently dangerous on many levels. In most situations, a client’s signature could be obtained easily. Hence, it seems CRPO’s version of ‘protecting the public’ has more to do with leaving themselves wiggle room to violate privacy and get away with it. Rather than hold members to truly meaningful standards of public protection, they simply cite ‘difficulties’ and lower their standards of engagement. And these impositions are all decided during secretive, Council meetings that CRPO refuses to record (see page 1: http://www.crpo.ca/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/June-2316-APPROVED-Council-MINUTES-w.-in-camera-removed.pdf) and tells attendees not to record, that are reported on with only the sketchiest of written notes, and where the public is generally not permitted any input or questioning of any kind. All of this ‘power’ was obtained through psychotherapy legislation that the documentation from the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care proves was invalid from the outset. We can end this covert, anti-democratic system that eliminates OUR privacy, OUR choice in healthcare and practitioner, and that puts US ALL at grave risk on many levels. We need only pool resources to access top-notch legal assistance to defend the initial court ‘test cases’ the College of Registered Psychotherapists has threatened against practitioners (see CRPO’s April 2016 webinar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_UQ9bhY2F0&feature=youtu.be). We need your help, including contributions to the legal fund. There are many ways to assist, and of course any donation is much appreciated: www.StopPsychotherapyTakeover.ca/donations