 Don March LMCCH
Since 1956 at the age of 27, Don’s major passion in life has been Hypnosis and the right to practise the professional application of this science. Don was forced to drop his involvement in Hypnotherapy when Victorian Legislation, restricting the practice of Hypnotherapy to Doctors and Psychologists (which he felt was a grave injustice) was introduced in 1965. The new Victorian Psychological Practices Act included prohibition clauses against the practice of Hypnotherapy, which eventually also became law in South Australia, Western Australia, Tasmania and Queensland.
In 1980, when Don's career changed direction, he became experienced in researching legislation and legal procedures. Although the restrictive legislation was still current in the State of Victoria in 1993, he studied Hypnotherapy and graduated in 1996 as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Hypnotic Science (AAHS), conducted by Jim and Joane Goulding. With his passion re-ignited, Don started to write. He wrote articles exposing legislation injustices and with his co-author Joane Goulding, as a Director of the Academy, wrote a series of submissions to the Victorian Health Minister, supporting the belief that restrictions should be repealed immediately, by proclaiming the following Act.
The 1985 Parliamentary Social Development Committee Inquiry had found no researched evidence of dangers, in the practice of Hypnosis. Consequently, the Government passed the new 1987 Psychologists Practice Act, which proposed to remove the restrictions on Hypnotherapy. However, the Psychologists prolonged the issue by failing to have the Act proclaimed for another 8 years, thus continuing to restrict the right of Hypnotherapists to practise.
Because of this impasse, Don and Joane kept up a constant campaign of newsletter articles and correspondence from 1993 to late 1997 to encourage the Minister for Health, Marie Tehan to expedite the legislation, already passed by Parliament in 1987.
Due to this campaign in that period, restrictions were lifted on 31st December 1997 enabling Hypnotherapists in Victoria to practise after 32 years of prohibition.
But Don and the Academy continued to campaign nationally and with Kate's ongoing voluntary secretarial assistance, prepared submissions to other State Government Health Department Inquiries into Psychology Acts, including Queensland in 1996, South Australia in 1997 and Western Australia in 1998. from the CCH Newsletter, 'Perspectives' Vol 1 Issue 1 (November 2006) |
