Parliamentary Lobby a great success!
We had a great day at the Scottish Parliament on Tuesday; a small but effective force of around 30-40 Herbalists and supporters. The NIMH banners went up and Keren Brynes MacLean brought along a fantastic display which made a great backdrop. Many many people had managed to get appointments with MSPs and some more were able to get a message through to the office on the day. Feedback from all of these meetings was encouraging. All parties seem to be getting the message now. Mike Pringle (Lib Dems), Dr Bill Wilson (SNP), Sarah Boyack (Labour) and Mary Scanlon (Conservatives) all braved the freezing cold to come out and find out more about the issues.
Mike Pringle said:
” I am very supportive of alternative and traditional medicines and practices and firmly believe that we must have the required statutory regulation in place as soon as possible. I have written to the Department of Health accordingly”
Dr Bill Wilson said:
“I was happy to meet the campaigners outside Scottish Parliament today. Herbal medicine has a long history, and remedies dispensed by qualified practitioners, who spend years at university, are likely to be safe and effective. However, as Claire Mullan of the ‘Save our Herbs’ campaign explained, because the profession is at present unregulated, there is a chance that the range of remedies practitioners can dispense will be severely curtailed when new EU legislation comes into force in 2011. This could even result in people ordering poor quality and dangerous preparations for themselves over the Internet.
In order to protect both the public and trained practitioners, it is important that the profession be properly regulated. I have submitted a short response to the Department of Health public consultation (that ends on 16th November) to this effect, and I would encourage others to do so. The consultation document may be long and complicated, not least because it includes Chinese Traditional Medicine and Acupuncture, subjects about which I know very little, but there is no reason why people cannot submit short statements as I did.”
Mary Scanlon spoke to Keren Brynes Maclean and offered to host a reception at the Scottish Parliament in order to inform the MSPs of the issues.
She has since been in touch to let us know she has submitted a written question.
“To ask the Scottish Executive what is being done to ensure that people in Scotland will continue to have access to Traditional herbal medicines, as currently used by Traditional Medicine Practitioners?”
The press also turned out and we had coverage from BBC Scotland on both TV and Radio. Fiona did an interview with The Scotsman which was published the next day. It is also available online. The Edinburgh Evening News has also offered us their Mouthpiece column to explain what the campaign on Tuesday was about and I’ve submitted a short piece for that. It will go out on Saturday 14th Nov.
A huge thank you to everyone who came along to support us and who came down to meet us. And also to everyone who worked so hard and helped make the two days possible. It’s not over yet but we’ve made a great start!