Janet Street-Porter: 'Healers' on the run – with your money

The Government has rightly decided that doctors in the UK must face annual tests to determine their competence, and reapply to renew their licences every five years, something which anxious patients pressed for in the wake of the Harold Shipman case. No such controls apply to the lucrative alternative therapy business, where practitioners extract money from the gullible by offering treatments ranging from the bizarre to the frankly dangerous.

If I'd planted a tree every time I've paid for some of these weird cures over the years, I'd have grown enough wood to ensure I had no more heating bills... and, if I'm truthful, it would probably have been a far more productive use of my money. I've had the irises of my eyes "read", my aura cleansed, my hair analysed, and I've listened to some incomprehensible weight loss experts. Am I any healthier as a result? No, but all these treatments offered me (as they do a lot of people) a little bit of comfort psychologically, if nothing else.

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Some therapies have entered the mainstream. The NHS now recognises the value of osteopathy and acupuncture. Massage is said to help to reduce blood pressure. The royals, including Prince Charles, swear by homeopathy. But the news that one of Europe's most wanted men, Radovan Karadzic, who instigated horrible violence against innocent fellow citizens, has spent his time on the run writing a weekly column about meditation for an alternative health magazine really takes the biscuit. Doesn't it just emphasise that thousands of people are currently working as alternative therapists with little or no qualifications, tapping in to our desire for healthier lifestyles. Karadzic, a trained psychiatrist, called himself an expert in "psycho energy" and saw patients at a centre outside Belgrade. He even had a website offering treatment for diabetes, using something called "quantum energy".

I don't doubt the gullible fell for it, just as I paid £60 to have a Russian woman run her hands around my body and eradicate "negative energy". That was a harmless con, but some a therapies can cause serious harm. Dawn Page won £800,000 in damages this week after injuries sustained when a nutritionist charged her £50 and advocated a diet which featured drinking a lot of water and reducing salt. The therapist, Barbara Nash – who also calls herself a "life coach" – described this ridiculous regime as "the Amazing Hydration Diet". Mrs Page says that when she started vomiting she was told it was "part of the detoxification" process.

What utter bilge. There's no such thing as toxins, except in the minds of people calling themselves alternative therapists. Mrs Page suffered brain damage and memory loss, enduring a six -year legal battle to reach a settlement. Mrs Nash, who has never admitted liability, obtained a diploma in Natural Nutrition at the College of Natural Nutrition, one of many such establishments. Log on to their website and discover that, if you pay £1,350, attend lectures from 11am to 5pm on Saturdays for 11 months and do the exam, you'll gain a diploma allowing you to practice as a nutritionist.

Reputable nutritionists want the Government to introduce compulsory licensing. I'd go one further. All alternative therapists should be licensed (like doctors) by the Department of Health, with far stricter controls set on the claims they can make. We scoff at the notion of a criminal like Karadzic offering healing – but every day unscrupulous therapists are taking huge fees from the public and offering little of any real benefit in return.

A very expensive revenge

Her website describes her as "activist... artist... woman and warrior", she's starred in a play (appropriately, perhaps) called Bonkers, as well as 500 TV ads. Tricia Walsh-Smith, left, loves being in front of cameras, but the wonderful video she posted on YouTube, in which she rants about her multimillionaire husband's sexual shortcomings and love of porn, has just cost her dearly. At their divorce hearing, the judge remained unimpressed that three million have seen Tricia's video and cut her settlement to just £350,000. The judge ruled that she'd elevated a private dispute into a public spectacle, causing hubbie "tremendous suffering". Meanwhile, she's holding press conferences and planning more television work.

* Shame that plans to open up the coastline to walkers have hit a stumbling block. The Committee considering the draft Bill want an independent appeals system set up, with compensation for any affected businesses. This ensures that the process takes decades and costs a fortune. Maintenance of the path should be overseen by local councils using funds allocated from the lottery, which is already paying for a chunk of the Olympics. The Government wants us to walk more – and the coastal path is a great way of doing that. At the moment, one third of the coastline is completely out of bounds to walkers – and one of the worst offenders is the Ministry of Defence. Can someone explain why some of our most beautiful coastline needs to be used for firing ranges? From Dorset to Kent, the seaside is desecrated by the Army, when there are plenty of better sites in the north and in Scotland, on moorland, miles from housing and tourist attractions.

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