Nurses (Amendment) Act 1961
| Jurisdiction | UK Non-devolved |
| Citation | 1961 c. 14 |
| Year | 1961 |
Nurses (Amendment) Act, 1961
(9 & 10 Eliz. 2) CHAPTER 14
An Act to amend the law relating to nurses for the sick.
Be it enacted by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:—
1 Roll of assistant nurses to be known as roll of nurses.
(1) The roll of assistant nurses maintained for England and Wales under paragraph (b of section two of the Act of 1957, and that maintained for Scotland under subsection (1) of section three of the Act of 1951, shall each be known as the roll of nurses; and the Assistant Nurses Committee under each of the said Acts shall be known as the Enrolled Nurses Committee.
(2) Any reference in rules made by the General Nursing Council for England and Wales or the General Nursing Council for Scotland, or in any certificate issued in pursuance of any such rules, to the roll of assistant nurses, the Assistant Nurses Committee, or an enrolled assistant nurse or assistant nurse, shall be construed as a reference to the roll of nurses, the Enrolled Nurses Committee, or an enrolled nurse, as the case may be.
2 Standards of training for admission to register and roll.
2. The training required by rules made under section three of the Act of 1957, or section six of the Act of 1951, as a condition of admission to the register shall be of a more advanced standard than that required by the rules as a condition of admission to the roll.
3 Registration of nurses trained abroad.
3. Subsection (2) of section four of the Act of 1957 and subsection (2) of section seven of the Act of 1951 (under which the General Nursing Council for England and Wales and the General Nursing Council for Scotland respectively, if of opinion that a person whose training abroad does not qualify him for registration could properly be registered after undergoing such further training in the United Kingdom as they may specify, may register that person on his undergoing the specified training in the United Kingdom to their satisfaction) shall each have effect with the omission of the words ‘in the United Kingdom’ in both places where they occur.
4 Increase in members of General Nursing Council for England and Wales.
(1) In sub-paragraph (a ) of paragraph 1 of the First Schedule to the Act of 1957 (which provides that the number of elected members of the General Nursing Council for England and Wales shall be seventeen) for the word ‘seventeen’ there shall be substituted the word ‘eighteen’; and in paragraphs 2 and 4 of that Schedule (which, amongst other things, require fourteen of the said elected members to be nurses registered in the general part of the register, and provide for the division of England and Wales into fourteen areas and for one such nurse to be elected for each such area) for the word ‘fourteen’, in each place where that word occurs, there shall be substituted the word ‘fifteen’.
(2) In sub-paragraph (b ) of paragraph 1 of the said First Schedule (which provides that twelve persons shall be appointed to membership of the Council by the Minister of Health) for the word ‘twelve’ there shall be substituted the word ‘thirteen’.
(3) The foregoing provisions of this section shall come into force at the beginning of the year nineteen hundred and sixty-two, and—
(a ) from then until the expiration on the twenty-first day of September, nineteen hundred and sixty-five, of the terms of office of the elected members of the Council holding office at the commencement of this Act, the additional place on the Council under subsection (1) of this section shall be filled by a person appointed thereto by the Council, being a nurse registered in the general part of the register who, on the date of the appointment, is engaged in such area as the Minister of Health may determine in nursing or in other work for which the employment of a registered nurse is requisite or for which a registered nurse is commonly employed;
(b ) the term of office of the additional member first appointed to the Council by virtue of subsection (2) of this section shall expire on the twenty-first day of September, nineteen hundred and sixty-three, being the date of expiration of the terms of office of the appointed members of the Council holding office at the commencement of this Act.
5 Failure to attend meetings of Councils for England and Wales or Scotland, or their committees.
(1) If a member of the General Nursing Council for England and Wales or the General Nursing Council for Scotland fails throughout a period of six consecutive months beginning on or after the date of the commencement of this Act to attend any meeting of the Council, then, unless they are satisfied that the failure was due to illness or other reasonable cause, the Council shall forthwith declare his place thereon to be vacant, and his membership of the Council, and of any committee of the Council, shall thereupon cease.
(2) For the purposes of the foregoing subsection, the attendance of a member of a Council at a meeting of any committee thereof of which he is also a member shall be deemed to be attendance at a meeting of the Council.
(3) Subject to the following subsection, if a member of any committee of the General Nursing Council for England and Wales or the General Nursing Council for Scotland fails through-out a period of six consecutive months beginning on or after the date of the commencement of this Act to attend any meeting of that committee, then, unless they are satisfied that the failure was due to illness or other reasonable cause, the committee (or, in the case of a committee constituted by either of the said Councils in pursuance of rules made by them under paragraph 11 of the First Schedule to the Act of 1957 or, as the case may be, paragraph 9 of the First Schedule to the Act of 1951, the Council by whom the committee was constituted) shall forthwith declare his place on the committee to be vacant, and his membership of the committee shall thereupon cease.
(4) The last foregoing subsection does not apply in relation to the place on the Mental Nurses Committee of either of the said Councils of any person who, by virtue of his membership of the Council in question, is required to be appointed to the said committee.
6 Continuance in office of appointed members of Councils, etc. notwithstanding loss of certain qualifications.
6. Where a person appointed by the Minister of Health or, as the case may be, the Secretary of State to a place on the General Nursing Council for England and Wales or the General Nursing Council for Scotland, or to a place on the Mental Nurses Committee of either of those Councils, ceases during his term of office to possess any qualification which he was required to possess as a condition of his appointment to that place but which consisted only of the holding by him of any employment or position, or of his being engaged in the teaching of any subject, his said place shall not become vacant by reason only of that fact unless, after consulting with the appropriate Council, the Minister or, as the case may be, the Secretary of State so determines.
7 Failure to elect members of Councils or their committees.
(1) Where a place on any body is required by the Act of 1957 or the Act of 1951 to be filled on any date by a person elected thereto, and, at the election of members of the body to take office on the date in question, no person is elected to that place, the place shall be filled instead by a person appointed thereto in accordance with the provisions of this section, being a person who would have been qualified for election thereto at the said election; and the person appointed shall, for the purposes of the Act of 1957 or, as the case may be, the Act of 1951, be deemed to have been so elected.
(2) An appointment to any place under the foregoing subsection shall be made as soon as may be after the date mentioned in that subsection, and—
(a ) in the case of a place on the General Nursing Council for England and Wales, the General Nursing Council for Scotland, or the Mental Nurses Committee of either of those Councils, shall be made by the Council in question;
(b ) in the case of a place on the Enrolled Nurses Committee of the General Nursing Council for England and Wales, shall be made by the Minister of Health;
(c ) in the case of a place on the Enrolled Nurses Committee of the General Nursing Council for Scotland, shall be made by the Secretary of State.
8 Expenses of members of committees of General Nursing Council for England and Wales.
8. Sub-paragraph (a ) of paragraph 13 of the First Schedule to the Act of 1957 (which authorises the General Nursing Council for England and Wales to make payments to members of the Council who have suffered loss of earnings or incurred additional expenses in performing duties as members of the Council) shall be amended as follows, that is to say—
and accordingly, paragraph 10 of the Third Schedule to the said Act and paragraph 10 of the...
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