D-Day -1 and they're taking out insurance!

Tomorrow European law will put mediums, healers, tarot readers, et al, under the same microscope as dodgy roofers and vacuum cleaner salesmen who refuse to leave until you buy.

However, unlike the dodgy roofers and vacuum cleaner salesmen, the Spiritaul Workers Association is offering its members insurance cover on all complementary therapies, including healing, mediumship and church ministry.

And it costs just £20.50 for a year for £1,000,000 of cover.

The premium is about the price of a single ticket for one of Derek Acorah's stage shows, so I'm sure he will already be clutching his policy document in his hot little hand!

The co-founders of the Spiritual Workers Association, Carole and David McEntee-Taylor, appeared on the BBC News programme this morning, together with a Trading Standards representative. Not the most eloquent of people interviewed on the programme, they did make some very important statements, nevertheless.

Carole McEntee-Taylor, who describes herself as "a healer, healer trainer, Reiki Master and massage therapist.":

"A medium will normally just give you a message from somebody who's passed over;they will just give you proof that the person is there."

No mention was made of the fact that a medium's definition of 'proof' does not accord with that of the law, or the courts. No matter what people may believe, there is, as yet, no actual proof that mediums receive messages from dead people.

Howevever, Mrs McEntee-Taylor had already made a major faux pas in a previous statement:

"When you give a message to somebody, when you speak to someone, I can talk to ou, and I can talk to fifteen different people, and I can say exactly the same thing, and they're all going to interpret it differently."

Exactly! Mediumship is not based on fact, but on the interpretation put on a reading by the client, something I know from personal experience! And why is "a healer, healer trainer, Reiki Master and massage therapist" giving readings anyway?

David McEntee-Taylor, medium and minister

"We (mediums) will try not to give you advance warning about anything because people have their own choise."

So where does that leave Derek Acorah? When things get sticky at his shows he seems to resort to "calling out a pregnancy" in an attempt to get the audience back onside. Even worse, he has warned of a forthcoming death!

According to their website:

The Spiritual Workers Association has started a new campaign to ask the government to create legislation that recognises genuine mediumship and healing and gives statutory protection to genuine Spiritualist, spiritualistic and spiritual practitioners.

However, no indication is given that they intend providing actual proof that anything they do is genuine, so it seems that we - and presumably the Government - are supposed to simply believe them.

Sorry folks, but it doesn't work like that!