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Facts & Evidence

For many years there have been well founded rumours that the GMC acted unfairly and the outcomes of disciplinary hearings were a foregone conclusion in a number of cases.

A. THE FACTS

1. The Case of Dr X

Dr X was unfairly erased from the medical register in 1987. In 2006 Dr X retrieved a bundle of
documents from the GMC and discovered, for the first time, a document headed “Draft
Determination” with the sentence “Erase” typed on the top. The document gave every appearance
of the decision being made prior to the hearing. At that time the GMC offered no satisfactory
explanation. As a result legal proceedings were issued.

In June and July 2008, the GMC’s own lawyers made written admissions that the GMC’s Assistant
Registrar, Robert Gray, had composed the Draft Determination document some weeks before the
original hearing and then gave it to the panel chairman who read it out at the end of the hearing.
The doctor was struck off/erased from the medical register.

2. The Case of Dr Y

Dr Y was unfairly erased from the register in 1990 and therefore been unable to practise since. He
was unable to get to the bottom of his injustice and later moved to the United States. In 2003 and
2004 Dr Y, made requests for his data and the GMC sent him unsorted and incomplete bundles of
documents which he later realised also contained a Draft Determination with a sentence of “Erasure”
typed at the top. In August 2008 he also joined the legal proceedings in London.

B. THE EVIDENCE

The Draft Determination with a Pre-determined Sentence of Erasure

1. The GMC admits that it was common practise for its staff, who also acted as committee secretaries, to compose Draft Determinations with Pre-determined sentences of Erasure, some weeks before the hearings.
2.  The Committee Secretary would then give the Draft Determination to the panel chairman who read
   it out as a final determination at the end of the hearing.
3. Dr Y’s Draft Determination not only shows that he was to be erased but it also has 2 further
   paragraph’s, one to be read out if the doctor was present at the hearing and the other to be
   read out if he was absent. The determination and the sentence of erasure remained the same.
   
4. There was an abuse of the process and PCC panels in these hearings were biased.
   

C. CONCLUSION

In both these cases the hearings were unfair and there has been a breach of natural justice and
also of Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

The GMC should not act as the prosecuting authority and also sit in judgement. The GMC
injustices which have been unearthed, and now admitted to by their lawyers, go way beyond what
is lawful, ethical and decent in UK medical regulation. The GMC and its Trustee body should agree
to remedy these wrongs and injustices.