Tweet A GP was struck off after a hearing lasting 40 days. He was found to suffer a delusional disorder. The New South Wales Court of Appeal recently delivered a long judgment in an appeal from that decision, as reported on ABC: Lindsay v Health Care Complaints Commission [2010] NSWCA 194.  The quote the doctor [...]

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Tweet Z v Dental Complaints Assessment Committee [2008] NZSC 55 is an important case which considers in depth just how quasi-criminal professional discipline proceedings should be.  It is a decision of New Zealand’s Supreme Court, their equivalent of our High Court, now 6 years old.  It considers the disciplinary prosecution of a dentist, acquitted of [...]

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Tweet Many new decisions of interest are coming out and I will not have time to blog them any time soon as I have to go to University and concentrate on my latest and hopefully last field of study, Shareholders Rights and Remedies.  Here are some pointers in case you want to read this slew [...]

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Tweet There is an interesting article by Ian Wheatley at (2008) 16 Journal of Law and Medicine 193.  Titled ‘The Criminalisation of Professional Misconduct Under the Health Professions Registration Act 2005 (Vic): How is a Fine of $50,000 Not Punitive?’. It compares the rights of alleged criminals and the maximum sentences in criminal law, with [...]

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Tweet Readers, to ‘chuck a Hercules’ is to follow in the footsteps of Keith Hercules, solicitor, of Melbourne whose suit for defamation against the complainant in respect of the complainant’s publication of a disciplinary complaint to the Law Institute is the subject of Hercules v Phease [1994] 2 VR 411, which I noted here.  (Compare [...]

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Tweet A study in the British Medical Journal has suggested that students from poorer families and students with poor marks are more likely to engage in serious professional misconduct than other students.  It should really suggest that such students are more likely to get caught engaging in serious professional misconduct, but it’s interesting nevertheless.  The [...]

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Tweet In Polglaze v The Veterinary Practitioners Board of NSW [2010] NSWCA 4, the NSW Court of Appeal did not seem to be impressed about an appeal reaching them in relation to a finding of unsatisfactory professional  conduct in failing to warn the owner of a dog-patient that a second sedating injection was going to [...]

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Tweet In Re a Psychologist [2009] TASSC 70, the Supreme Court of Tasmania quashed a decision of the Psychologists Registration Board of Tasmania to suspend a psychologist for 6 months for entering into a sexual relationship with a former patient fewer than 2 years after the end of the therapeutic relationship.  In fact he married [...]

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Tweet The Herald Sun has been active recently with front page excoriation of VCAT’s professional regulatory review jurisdiction for letting loose on the public again those they have described in unusually large letters as ‘sex fiends’ and ‘insane killers‘.  The two decisions are SL v Medical Practitioners Board of Victoria [2008] VCAT 2077, a decision [...]

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Tweet Lovegrove & Lord‘s Kim Lovegrove and barrister Sav Korica have just published a little book called Disciplinary Hearings and Advocacy (Hybrid, 2009). It sells for $39.95. Lovegrove is the Chairman of the Building Practitioners Board, and presides over disciplinary hearings. I suspect that frustration with other decision makers’ decision making (‘there may exist some, [...]

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