BEVA Members To Stand in RCVS and VN Councils elections
Friday, February 10, 2017
The Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS) has announced the candidates standing in the 2017 RCVS Council and Veterinary Nurses (VN) Council elections and is, once again, inviting veterinary surgeons and veterinary nurses to put their questions to them directly in this year’s ‘Quiz the candidates’.

There are 16 candidates contesting six places in the RCVS Council, including three existing Council members eligible for re-election and 13 candidates not currently on Council. They are:

• Dr Caroline Allen MRCVS
• Miss Sarah Brown MRCVS
• Mr Danny Chambers MRCVS - BEVA Member
• Mr John Davies MRCVS
• Dr Chris Gray MRCVS
• Mr David Leicester MRCVS
• Dr Tom Lonsdale MRCVS
• Mr Martin Peaty MRCVS - BEVA Member
• Mr Matthew Plumtree MRCVS
• Professor Cheryl Scudamore FRCVS
• Dr Huw Stacey MRCVS
• Dr Christopher Tufnell MRCVS - BEVA Member
• Mr Kevin Watts MRCVS
• Dr Trevor Whitbread MRCVS
• Dr Thomas Witte MRCVS
• Mr James Yeates FRCVS 

Four veterinary nurses are contesting two places in this year’s VN Council elections. Two of these are existing VN Council members eligible for re-election while two candidates are not currently on VN Council. They are:

• Mr Miguel Borralho RVN 
• Mrs Susan Howarth RVN 
• Mrs Andrea Jeffery RVN
• Miss Marie Rippingale REVN - BEVA Member


Ballot papers and candidates’ details are due to be posted to all veterinary surgeons and veterinary nurses eligible to vote during the week commencing 13 March, and all votes must be cast, either online or by post, by 5pm on Friday 28 April 2017.

Once again the College is inviting members of both professions to ‘Quiz the candidates’ by putting their questions directly to all those standing for election. Each candidate will then be invited to choose two questions to answer from all those received, and produce a video recording of their answers. Recordings will be published on the RCVS website on Thursday 16 March. 

The biographies and statements for each candidate in the RCVS Council and VN Council elections are available.

Eleanor Ferguson, RCVS Registrar, said: “This year we will be publishing the candidate biographies and statements online ahead of the start of the official voting period. This is to allow both veterinary surgeons and veterinary nurses to be better informed about the candidates and their reasons for standing before they put their questions forward. 

“We would strongly encourage all members of the professions to review the candidate profiles and pose questions for them to answer. We hope it will spark some interesting debates about how the profession is regulated.” 

Vets and nurses should email their question (NB only one per person) to vetvote17@rcvs.org.uk or VNvote17@rcvs.org.uk, post it on the College’s Facebook page (www.facebook.com/thercvs) or on Twitter using the hashtags #vetvote17 or #VNvote17, respectively, by midday on Monday 27 February.



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