Statute of the Swiss Society of Cognitive Relational Counselling
Article 5 Admission of members
Article 6 Resignation and loss of membership
Article 10 Institutional members
Article 13 Resignation and loss of membership
Article 14 Organs of the association
Article 16 Management Committee – Composition
Article 17 Management Committee – General competence
Article 18 Management Committee – Disciplinary competence
Article 19 Meeting of Teaching Members
Article 20 Scientific Committee
Article 21 Board of Arbitrators
Article 22 Competence of the Board of Arbitrators
Article 26 Liability and social property
The association named Swiss Society for Cognitive Relational Counselling (SSCRC) is constituted according to the articles 60 and ff. of the Swiss Civil Code.
The registered office of the association is in Lugano.
The objective of the association is promoting the investigation of theoretical, clinical and practical aspects of counselling and promoting training, consulting and supervision within the domain of counselling; the subscription and coordination of associations of varying theoretical modalities relative to the activity of counselling, practice, training and research; to garantee a code of ethics, a complaints procedure and means of recognizing professional comptence. To collaborate with the EAC.
The association is non-profit.
Membership is open to natural and legal persons sharing the object of the association. There are six categories of members:
- Supporting members
- Ordinary members
- Teaching members
- Institutional members
- Honorary members
- Sponsoring members
Applications for membership are submitted to the Management Committee, whose decisions are final and do not need to be publicly motivated.
Loss of membership can happen by resignation, lapse, exclusion, arrearage or expulsion.
Expulsion is deliberated by the General Meeting upon motivated proposal by the Board of Arbitrators.
Ordinary members can resign by written communication.
Supporting member can be any person sharing the object of the association.
Ordinary member can be any person who has completed a counselling training and is accredited by the Management Committee according to the by-laws of the association.
The by-laws of the association define the standards and criteria of accreditation for members and training institutes; they further define a National Register of Cognitive Counsellors.
Teaching member can be any person who has been an ordinary member of the association for at least six years and has a distinguished record of scientific-didactic activity and of furthering of the objectives of the association.
The by-laws of the association define the criteria.
Institutional member can be any institute or organisation that shares the objectives of the association and specific requests such as status. Institutional members can call themselves "associate SNAC".
Honorary member can be any person who has given an outstanding contribution to the development of counselling and who accepts to become a member of the SNAC conforming to these articles of association.
Honorary members are appointed by the President upon recommendation of the Management Committee.
Sponsoring member can be any natural or legal person that shares the object of the association and financially supports it.
All members, except honorary members, pay an admission fee and a yearly membership fee.
Loss of membership can happen by resignation, lapse, exclusion, arrearage or expulsion.
Expulsion is deliberated by the General Meeting upon motivated proposal by the Board of Arbitrators.
Ordinary members can resign by written communication.
The organs of the association are:
a) The General Meeting
b) The Management Committee
c) The Meeting of Teaching Members
d) The Scientific Committee
e) The Board of Arbitrators
f) The Auditing Organ
All members can participate in the General Meeting.
Only ordinary members have voting rights.
The competence of the General Meeting includes:
a) approving the yearly management and financial statements;
b) appointing the President, the Secretary and the other members of the Management Committee;
c) appointing the Auditors;
d) amending or totally revising the articles of association;
e) fixing the amount of the membership fee;
f) approving the association's by-laws;
g) approving the profession's deontological code;
h) all deliberations that the law and these articles of association do not assign to a different organ.
The annual General Meeting is convened by the Management Committee within six months from the end of the financial year to approve the yearly financial statement.
An extraordinary General Meeting must be convened by the Management Committee within thirty days from a proposal by the committee itself or by one fifth of the members holding voting rights.
The General Meeting must be convened by a letter indicating the address, date and time of the meeting, mailed to members not later than ten days before the appointed date; in case of motivated urgency such term can be shortened to five days.
The letter must further specify the date and time of a second convocation, in case in the first the General Meeting should not be validly constituted.
The General Meeting is presided upon by the President.
For the election of the President the meeting is presided upon by a temporary President.
In first convocation the General Meeting is valid when at least half of the members are present.
In second convocation the General Meeting is validly constituted whatever the number of members present.
The General Meeting deliberates by majority of votes of the members present.
In case of draw, the President's vote is decisive.
To amend the object of the association the presence and vote of a majority of members is required.
Voting and elections are by show of hands, or, if requested by one third of the members present with voting rights (rounded off to the nearest lower whole number if needed), by poll or ballot.
The deliberations of the General Meeting are recorded in minutes, signed by the President and the Secretary, which will be approved by the next General Meeting.
The Management Committee is elected by the General Meeting, is in office for three years, can be re-elected and consists of:
- the President;
- the Secretary;
- three or more other members.
The competence of the Management Committee includes:
a) caring for the association's interest, deliberating upon and managing all current matters involved in the association's direction;
b) representing the association before third parties, also in legal proceedings;
c) submitting the yearly management and financial statements to the General Meeting;
d) convening and preparing the General Meeting;
e) keeping the register of members;
f) formulating plans for the association's activities and for the enterprises to be undertaken in order to fulfil the association's object;
g) approving the annual program of activities of the association;
h) deliberating upon membership applications;
i) setting up the association's by-laws specifying training standards, criteria for recognition as counsellor and as teacher, training syllabi in general, accreditation criteria, inner and outer relationships and generally all aspects of the management and of the pursuit of the object of the association;
j) fixing the amount of the yearly membership fee;
k) fixing the amount of the admission fee.
The Managing Committee validly deliberates when half of its members (rounded off to the nearest higher whole number if needed) are present.
The Managing Committee deliberates by majority of votes of the members present.
In case of draw, the President's vote is decisive.
Voting is by show of hands.
When the Management Committee is informed of a member's behaviour contradicting the obligations underwritten upon joining the association (in the frame of his/her membership category), or in any way damaging the association's image, it can, considering the seriousness of the above mentioned behaviour:
a) deliver a formal reprimand, warning the member not to persist in or repeat the actions under consideration;
b) ask the member to publicly amend/retract the statements or actions under consideration;
c) refer the member to the Board of Arbitrators.
a) The Meeting of Teaching Members consists of the teaching members and of the members of the Managing Committee who are not arreared in the payment of their membership fees.
b) The Meeting of Teaching Members convenes ordinarily in coincidence with the General Meeting and extraordinarily whenever the Managing Committee or the Scientific Committee or at least one third of the teaching members request such a meeting.
c) Each teaching member has a vote and can be represented by proxy by another teaching member able to participate in the meeting.
d) The meeting is presided upon by the President, or in his/her absence by the oldest member present. The minutes are drafted on a specific register by the Secretary of the Managing Committee, or in his/her absence by a member of the Scientific Committee.
e) The Meeting of Teaching Members deliberates by majority of votes of the members present.
f) The meeting sanctions the admission of new teaching members whose applications have been positively evaluated by the Scientific Committee.
g) The Meeting of Teaching Members deliberates upon the promotion and qualitative improvement of the didactic, scientific and cultural activity of the association.
For that purpose it promotes the sharing of didactic experiences among schools and the definition of guidelines to guarantee the quality of the training process; it promotes research in the field of cognitive counselling and spreads information about the most significant scientific works; and it supervises and quality-checks the scientific and cultural activity of the association.
In order to perform these tasks more efficiently it can split into working groups, which the meeting can entrust with specific tasks, also involving a decisional aspect.
The Scientific Committee consists of two teaching members, appointed by the President upon designation by the Meeting of Teaching Members.
Whenever required by these articles of association or requested by the Meeting of Teaching Members, the Scientific Committee expresses a preliminary evaluation of transactions to be submitted for approval to the Meeting of Teaching Members itself.
The motivated evaluation of the Scientific Committee is not binding for further deliberations.
The Scientific Committee gathers from the secretarial staff of the association the information needed to verify the fulfilment of the requirements for maintaining the attribute of teaching member; in case of default, it reports its findings to the Meeting of Teaching Members for appropriate corrective action to be taken.
The Board of Arbitrators consists of three members, chosen by the General Meeting among a group of candidates proposed by the meeting itself through the President.
Whenever a member of the board renounces his/her role after having accepted it, a replacement is appointed by the same procedure as the initial nomination.
The competence of the Board of Arbitrators is limited to the disputes submitted to it in the proper forms.
The members of the Board of Arbitrators are in office for three years and can be re-elected without limit.
The title of arbitrator is incompatible with any other office within the association.
The expenses incurred through the activities of the board are covered by a specific balance-sheet item.
A member who violates the articles or the by-laws of the association, behaves unethically, does not comply with legitimate decisions of the organs of the association or, in spite of being formally reprimanded, unjustifiably persists in disregarding the obligations undertaken by joining the association is referred to the Board of Arbitrators.
Likewise can apply to the Board of Arbitrators a member who has been wronged by an illegitimate decision, in terms of the association's articles and by-laws, of the association's organs.
Excluded from the competence of the Board of Arbitrators are the disputes about membership fees and appointment to office.
The decision to apply to the Board of Arbitrators can be made by the Managing Committee or can be proposed by a member or by an organ of the association with a motivated written request addressed to the President.
Upon receiving such a request, within the peremptory term of sixty days, the President attempts whatever is in his/her power to remove the cause of the complaint.
This term elapsed, the President must integrally forward the request, accompanied by his/her own motivated report, to the Board of Arbitrators, simultaneously notifying all concerned parties by registered letter.
The Board of Arbitrators prepares the case, listens to the parties, evaluates the evidence and decides the dispute; whenever necessary, it decrees which actions must be undertaken in order to protect the image and the dignity of the association.
When the decision of the board involves the proposed expulsion of a member from the association, the board sends the corresponding minutes to the President for inclusion in the agenda of the General Meeting.
All acts of the board are written and are drafted in minutes containing the motivations of the decisions reached and signed by all members.
The Board of Arbitrators deliberates according to the law and by majority of votes of its members.
The board proposes to the General Meeting a draft of deontological code.
Every year the General Meeting appoints an auditor, who can always be re-elected.
The financial accounting of the SSCC is closed annually on the 31st of December, beginning with December 31st 2004.
The association is represented by the joint signatures of the President and of a member of the Management Committee.
The income and the social property of the association consist mainly of the admission fees, the yearly membership fees and public and private contributions.
The association's liability is limited to the social property only.
All personal liability of its members or of the members of the Management Committee is excluded.
If the dissolution of the association is proposed by the Management Committee or by at least three members of it, a General Meeting must be convened to deliberate exclusively on this item.
This General Meeting will be validly constituted when at least three quarters of the members with voting rights (rounded off to the nearest higher whole number if needed) are present.
If this quorum is not reached, the meeting can commence one hour after the stated meeting time and deliberate with a majority of three quarters of the members present (rounded off to the nearest higher whole number if needed).
Should the meeting be unable to reach a conclusion, the General Meeting will be re-convened within the next thirty days with the same agenda.
In this second meeting deliberations will be made by simple majority whatever the number of members present.
When the dissolution of the association has been approved by the General Meeting, the meeting itself must deliberate all actions needed for the winding-up.
The remaining credit balance, after payment of all debts, must be assigned to institutes or associations carrying out similar activities.
All distribution of social property among the members is excluded.
The Management Committee will act as the executive organ for the winding-up and will resign its mandate to a closing General Meeting.
All matters not included in these articles of association will be ruled by the articles 60 and ff. of the Swiss Civil Code.
These articles of association have been approved by the founding General Meeting on the 14th of February 2004.