Presentation of CPLOL

Sommaire Summary Text in French

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Presentation of CPLOL

Dietlinde Schrey- Dern
President of CPLOL
Email: schrey@dbl-ev.de

Twelve years ago a number of professional organisations representing speech and language therapists-logopedists in different European countries met in Paris on the suggestion of the Fédération Nationale des Orthophonistes (France) in order to discuss a new proposal to encourage collaboration at an international level. In a very short time this plan became a reality and the Standing Liaison Committee of Speech and Language Therapists in the European Union (known by its French initials: CPLOL) was formed in 1988 at the instigation of Jacques Roustit, who became its first and much respected President.

The representatives of the nine founder countries were quickly joined by others and they first of all spent time getting to know and respect each other. The Organisation was marked by co-operation, mutual respect and a real spirit of co-operation and European solidarity.

But what are the actual organisation of CPLOL and its fields of competencies ?

Organisation of CPLOL

At present all countries of the European Union, except Spain, are represented in CPLOL. Beside the full members there are also professional associations as observer members: Cyprus, Estonia, Norway, Spain, and Switzerland. At the moment many associations of the eastern European countries, i.e. Bulgaria or Poland, are interested in joining CPLOL. By integrating these associations to CPLOL if they fit the requirements of the statutes, CPLOL seems to be well prepared to the enlargement of the European Union.

The way CPLOL works, is based on the statutes which have been adopted at its beginning and revised for the last time in May 1999.

The full member associations of CPLOL have to mandate three delegates with the right to vote at the General Assembly (G.A.), meeting once every two years. Observer members are not entitled to vote; they will be invited on a regular basis to attend statutory meetings.

The General Assembly (G.A.) is convened by the Executive Committee, and shall lay down the main lines of policy for CPLOL, elect the Executive Committee or make alterations to the Statutes when it is necessary.

The Executive Committee (E.C.) is the body responsible for carrying out the decisions of the General Assembly. The E.C. shall be elected for a period for two years; six different countries have to be represented on the E.C.

Composition of the E.C. from 1999 to 2001

President	Dietlinde Schrey-Dern	Germany
General Secretary	Jacques Roustit	France
Treasurer	Bent Kjaer	Denmark
Vice-presidents:
Professional Exercise	Frieda Brauneis	Austria
Education	Marianne Leterme	Belgium
Prevention	Birgitta Rósen-Gustafsson	Sweden
Research-documentation-data bank	Pierre Dessailly	Belgium
International Relations	Thalia Zolotas	Greece

Fields of competences

Regarding the different tasks of the vice-presidents of CPLOL there are different fields of competences to distinguish: i.e. development of guidelines for professional exercise, initial and continuing education, prevention and research. The work in these different fields of competence is realized in different working groups, called committee:

Education – professional exercise Committee, chaired by Frieda Brauneis and Marianne Leterme;
Prevention Committee, chaired by Birgitta Rósen-Gustafsson;
Research – data bank Committee, chaired by Pierre Dessailly.

The different projects already achieved, i.e. the Professional Profile, the Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct or the Prevention Report, are published by CPLOL in the edition "1988-1998 – 10 years of activity". The current projects, as the European Data-bank, the work on a European classification system in speech and language pathology or the survey on prevention projects in Europe are presented by the vice-presidents responsible for this work.