The Medical Defence Union (MDU) believes that the GMC's proposals for a Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) would not make it independent enough from the GMC. In its consultation response*, the UK's leading medical defence organisation suggests the GMC needs to do more work to reassure doctors about its plans.

Deputy head of the MDU's advisory department, Dr Catherine Wills, said:

"Any hearing that has the power to examine allegations against doctors and impose sanctions has the potential to end doctors' careers and must therefore be demonstrably fair, impartial and independent, in line with Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights. At the moment, the GMC acts as investigator, prosecutor and judge so it is like the police, the CPS and the judiciary all rolled into one. Obviously this has to change and we are pleased to see that the GMC is working towards a separation.

However, we don't think the GMC's proposals go far enough and we think there needs to be greater safeguards to ensure tribunals that decide on a doctor's fitness to practise are completely independent of the GMC. For example, there is no mention of whether the MPTS will need to take account of GMC indicative sanctions guidance when deciding what action to take against a doctor whose fitness to practise is found impaired. In the same way that it would be inappropriate for the Crown Prosecution Service to impose sentencing guidelines on judges in criminal proceedings, it must be clear that the ultimate decision on sanctions should be for the tribunals themselves. The GMC's sanctions guidance can go into the pot, but the decision on sanction must ultimately be for the MPTS.

"The GMC consultation also suggests that it should have the right of appeal against MPTS decisions which it considers unduly lenient, alongside the Council for Healthcare Regulatory Excellence (CHRE) which already has this power. We believe this would create a cruel element of double jeopardy in which doctors who have been exonerated by a tribunal then have to wait to find out if either the GMC or CHRE wanted to appeal the decision. Not only that but doctors concerned could effectively find themselves paying the GMC's legal costs through their annual registration fee, as well as two sets of defence costs, through their membership of organisations like the MDU. This is clearly unfair and contrary to the Government's recently expressed policy of keeping the burden of registration and regulatory costs to a minimum. It may be in the public interest for one body to be able to appeal fitness to practise decisions but not for two separate bodies to have the same powers.

"The MDU recognises that there needs to be a rigorous and credible way of examining fitness to practise concerns in the interests of the profession and patient safety. We want to work constructively with the GMC to help ensure fitness to practise tribunals will be independent and act in the interests of justice for all doctors."

Further information
The MDU is a mutual, not for profit, organisation owned by our members who include over 50 per cent of the UK's hospital doctors and GPs. Established in 1885, we were the world's first medical defence organisation. We defend the professional reputations of our members when their clinical performance is called into question. Our benefits of membership include insurance* for claims of clinical negligence and a wide range of medico-legal advisory services.

Source:
Susan Field
The Medical Defence Union (MDU)