1. Vote AGAINST the Governance Changes On June 6th
Reform APS
Vote AGAINST the Governance Changes
On June 6th
24/02/2019

2. About Reform APS
Reform APS (RAPS) is a growing group of concerned APS members, which began in November 2016.
Their aim is to bring about:
the revitalisation of the Australian Psychological Society
to promote the expertise of all its members, regardless of training pathway taken
and to successfully advance the discipline and diversity of the profession of psychology for the benefit of all Australians.
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3. APS Governance Review
Reform APS believes the recommended governances changes will not unite members of the society, but will clause further division because of the privileging of clinical psychology at the expense of all other psychological approaches.
This is against the Objects of the APS Constitution (1.a) “ …to enhance the contribution of psychology to the promotion of the public welfare by encouraging the development of all branches of psychology”
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4. Reform APS Governance Review
Reform APS has provided its own review of proposed APS governance changes, which is laid out in the following slides
We argue that the proposal does not address the real issues in the society, that the APS board continues to support the two-tier system.
The GRC did not conduct an independent review as its committee was over represented with clinical psychologists.
We strongly recommend members to vote AGAINST the special resolution on June 6th.
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5. Proposed Governance Structure
A new board with up to 13 directors
A Nominations Committee
To advise who should be co-opted to provide “advice to the Board on geographical spread and financial competency 
Advisory Council for Psychological Matters
(see Inpsych August 2016 for the details)
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6. Potential Issues with Proposal
It will favour a few and disadvantage the many
Members have not been fully informed – a No case has not been provided to members
The election process has been undemocratic and heavily biased in the direction of one outcome
Lack of detail leaves the implementation open to abuse once passed
No costs/benefits analysis provided of the entire proposal
High cost of adding another large committee (54) to the current list of members groups
5. Unacceptable number of unelected positions on all levels of the new structure - the new Board, Nominations Committee and Advisory Council
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7. Potential Issues with Proposal
The reason for the change is confusing - will the new board be representational or not?
But the APS has warned that directors should not represent particular sections of the society – yet they are changing the structure so that directors are voted in by particular sections of the society.
Does this mean that in future, board members will represent the interests of their particular sections, rather than of the society as a whole?
This would go against the legal definition that Directors should govern on behalf of all the shareholders?
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8. Potential Issues with Proposal
How many members will have the time to scrutinize all these Constitutional changes?
What other changes to the APS constitution will be included in this vote?
Are we moving us towards a American presidential style leadership of the society?
Are members from the same group expected to vote for ‘their’ candidates (like a political party)? In this case only two positions are elected by the entire membership - the President elect & the early career.
This years board represented a broader range of members than any other board in 17 years – why change it?
than every before
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9. The Proposed Board composition
National Executive: 3
President
President-Elect (in a year when the President-Elect is elected)
Executive Director (appointed by the board, not elected by members)
General Directors: 6
Two are elected from and by the Colleges (one is exclusively clinical)
Two are elected from and by the Division of General Psychological Practice (DGPP)
One is elected from and by the Division of Psychological Research, Education and Training (DPRET) (academics)
One is elected from Early Career members by all the “voting” membership
Additional Directors: 4 - selected by the Nominations Committee
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10. Potential Issues with the Board
Clinical College will continue to dominate the board holding 8 /13 positions. This will only get worse as time goes on as the colleges diminish
National Executive: 3 out of 3 expected to be clinical
President and Executive Director remain (both clinical)
President elect likely to be clinical (historical)
General Director positions – 3 out of 3 expected to be clinical
One is a guaranteed clinical
The early career & academic are expected to be clinical (as no other courses available)
Two of the four additional directors expected to remain clinical
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11. Potential Issues with the Board
The Executive Director role should have been removed from the board as that positon has become too powerful and should be split into two.
Advocacy should be done by a professional independent lobbyist, not the Executive Director
The board requires an independent secretary, not the Executive Director’s secretary
The Corporations Act (2001) warns against any directors holding tenure longer than 9 years (Sec.2.4) as they can no longer be “…considered independent.”
The current Executive Director’s term has been 17 years.
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12. Potential Issues with the Board
There is only one (1) position for eight (8) colleges.
The early career position is a furphy - and ageist. People should be nominated and elected on the basis of their expertise and competence not their age/inexperience.
There is no representation for regional, rural and remote members on the board.
A new review is required with an independent Governance Review Committee (GRC) with greater representation of all members.
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13. Proposed Nominations Committee
To assist the Board to identify the most appropriate and qualified nominees for additional Directors
It would perform two main functions
provide advice to the Board on priority areas relevant to Board composition e.g. geographical spread and financial competency
Identify suitably qualified additional Directors who could add value to the functioning of the Board at the relevant time.
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14. Potential Issues with the Nominations Committee
The selection of the four additional directors has traditionally been performed by the board.
This has become very controversial as the additional directors can hold the balance of power (like this year’s board).
This year the three additional directors were all clinical, including a neuro-clinical director
The Nominations Committee appears to be an attempt to control the selection of the additional directors off line.
The proposed governance changes do not capture what is really problematic about the APS board.
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15. Potential Issues with the Nominations Committee
Why remove this function from the board?
Why is the President on this Committee if it is to be truly independent?
What if the board doesn’t want to accept their recommendations?
No one on the Nominations Committee will be elected. How will they be selected?
There is not enough information on how this powerful, invisible group would function
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16. Proposed Advisory Council
There will be 54 people on this Council, including the President, as Chair
Nine College Chairs
Eight State Committee Chairs
Nine DGPP representatives
Nine DPRET representatives
Nine Interest Group Convenors
Three Early Career representatives
Three Indigenous psychologists
Three Rural and Remote members
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17. Potential Issues with the Council
It is a large unwieldy body of 54 members from across Australia, who will meet twice a year to discuss and formulate advice and policy recommendations.
It will add another layer of  bureaucracy to the 230 member groups and committees that already discuss and formulate advice and policy recommendations.
Such a large number of people meeting together is not only inefficient but also extremely expensive for the Society if they meet twice a year each year.
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18. Potential Issues with the Council
The composition of the Council is unclear and we are being asked to vote to accept this without enough detail.
If passed in its current form, the composition could easily be changed afterwards as they have only put forward a proposed make up of the Council.
Based on current information, twenty seven (27) of the proposed Council members – or 50% – would not be elected by members, but hand picked by National Office.
If the Board must accept the recommendations from this Council then it makes the Council a very powerful body.
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19. Potential Issues with DPRET
DPRET representatives – 9 members
It is unclear who the DPRET representatives are. On the APS website there are 12 DPRET Forum members (of which Lyn Littlefield is one and also the Co-Chair).
DPRET is over represented on the Council - With approximately 2000 members – or 11% of the membership.
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20. Potential Issues with DGPP
DGPP representatives – 9 members
There is no concrete information on who these 9 will be but it is presumed that the 9 will be the current 9 state/territory DGPP representatives.
These members have been selected by national office
With approximately 12,000 members – or 54% of the membership – they are seriously under represented on the Council.
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21. Potential Issues with Early Career
Early career representatives – 3 members
There is no concrete info on who these 3 will be, but it is presumed that they will come from the Early Career Advisory group.
The current Early Career Advisory group has 5 members, all of whom were selected by National Office. This group is seriously over represented.
No need for them to be on the board as well
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22. Potential Issues with the Council
Rural and Remote Members – 3 members
There is no concrete info on who these 3 will be, but it is presumed that they will come from the Rural and Remote Advisory group.
We understand that all the current members of the Rural and Remote Advisory group have been selected by National Office. (Not to be confused with the Rural and remote Interest Group)
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23. Potential Issues with Indigenous
3 Indigenous Psychologists – 3 members
There is no concrete information on who these 3 will be.
Summary:
If the Council has the power to propose policy to the Board and the Board are obliged to follow and accept their recommendations, then it makes a mockery of the board.  
We recommend strongly voting against the introduction of these changes.
A summary of the governance proposals can be found in the August 2016 of InPsych magazine.
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24. Vote AGAINST the Governance Proposal
Proposal is too far reaching and outcomes are unknown.
The rationale for the new structure is confusing and unclear
Members have not been provided with enough information to be able to make an informed decision
It is unwieldy and expensive without costings and projections
It is advantages clinical college over all other colleges and divisions
The process of putting it forward has been biased and one- sided
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25. RAPS recommends you vote ‘No’ to the special resolution
at the general meeting on
June 6th to change the
governance of the APS
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26. Thank you for your attention
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