“But Does it Go Far Enough?”

Arts therapists practising in the UK must be registered to the statutory regulator, the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC), and adhere to their various standards, including the Standards of Proficiency (HCPC, 2023a). In 2023, these standards were significantly revised. This paper shares perspectives on how these revisions relate to emerging critical discourse on disability and music therapy. In relation to the construct of disability, music therapy has historically aligned itself, knowingly or unknowingly, with medically-informed paradigms. However, in recent years this has been questioned through engagement with other perspectives on disability (Cameron, 2014; Davies, 2022; Leza, 2020). Any revisions to the Standards of Proficiency have the potential to reflect these perspectives, impact practices which engage disabled people, and affect ongoing growth within the profession. In this spirit, each author has chosen aspects of these revised standards as starting points for reflecting on the following topics within music therapy: shifting paradigms around disability; disability and pedagogy; collaborative practice and research with disabled people; and the role of anti-oppressive language. We acknowledge the complexity of these issues and aim to raise questions rather than provide answers, inviting our audience to challenge and be challenged as they contribute to the profession. Acknowledgements We would like to acknowledge our colleague David Limmer, who was initially part of these discussions and was due to present alongside us. David planned to share his perspective as a disabled music therapist and present on the topics of accessibility and building collaborative approaches to music therapy with disabled people. Unfortunately, the late withdrawal of the option to attend the 2024 BAMT conference online that was initially promised meant that David was unable to attend, and he did not feel comfortable remotely participating in a roundtable about the issues faced by disabled people for a conference he and others were unable to be a part of.