The High Court confirmed the Medical Council’s decision to censure a doctor and impose conditions on his continued registration, and ordered him to pay the Council’s costs of the confirmation application.
The judgment, delivered by Mr Justice Hedigan on 1 February 2011, concerned an application under section 76 of the Medical Practitioners Act 2007. The Council had decided on 21 July 2010 to censure the respondent and attach conditions to his registration. The judgment says that the respondent did not appeal. At the hearing on 11 October 2010, his counsel consented to the confirmation application and sought to be heard only on costs.
The underlying inquiry concerned the respondent’s treatment of a three-month-old baby while he was working as a general practitioner in the United Kingdom, on or around 23 June 2006. The Fitness to Practise Committee found four allegations of professional misconduct proven. The judgment describes the allegations as involving an inappropriate and unnecessary examination and an inappropriate and excessive medication dose after the respondent diagnosed colic.
The Court considered whether it could award costs even though section 76 does not address them. Relying on a Supreme Court decision concerning a similar application under earlier legislation, Mr Justice Hedigan held that the Court retained jurisdiction to decide costs. He said the Council is required by law to seek confirmation and that, absent special grounds, awarding it costs was a reasonable exercise of discretion, even where the doctor had indicated he would not oppose confirmation.
The judge stressed that costs should not be used as punishment and that the Court retained discretion to make no costs order in an appropriate case. No special reasons for withholding costs had been advanced here, so he ordered the respondent to pay the Council’s costs of the confirmation application.
The judgment addresses confirmation of the Council’s sanction and costs. It does not describe a rehearing of the misconduct allegations; it explains that a practitioner’s statutory appeal under section 75 would involve a rehearing de novo.