The General Medical Council Health Committee (Procedure) Rules Order of Council 1987

Made: 16th December 1987

Laid before Parliament: 17th December 1987

Coming into force: 14th January 1988

At the Council Chamber, Whitehall, the 16th day of December 1987 By the Lords of Her Majesty’s Most Honourable Privy Council

Now, therefore, Their Lordships, having taken the said Rules into consideration, are pleased to, and do hereby, approve the same as set out in the Appendix to this Order.

This Order may be cited as the General Medical Council Health Committee (Procedure) Rules Order of Council 1987, and shall come into force on 14th January 1988.

SCHEDULE 1

Provisions as to meetings of the Committee

1

The Committee shall meet on such days as the Chairman, Committee or Council may determine and at such time as the Chairman, may determine.

2

Members of the Committee shall be summoned to meetings of the Committee by the Registrar, by notice addressed to each member. Except in the case of a meeting held to resume the hearing of a case which has been adjourned or postponed for less than 28 days, such notice shall be sent not less than three weeks before the meeting to which it relates.

3

Meetings of the Committee shall be held at the offices of the Council unless the Council or in emergency the President shall otherwise direct.

SCHEDULE 2

Medical examiners and medical assessors

4

• (a) Subject to paragraph (b) below, in choosing medical examiners and medical assessors to act in relation to particular cases, the President or Committee shall have regard to the nature of the physical or mental condition which is alleged to impair the practitioner’s fitness to practise.

• (b) In choosing medical assessors to advise the Committee the President shall include one assessor who is engaged in the same branch of medical practice as the practitioner.

5

• (a) It shall be the duty of the medical assessors to be present at the proceedings before the Committee for which they have been chosen to act and to advise the Committee on the medical significance of the information before the Committee.

• (b) Medical assessors shall give such advice on questions referred to them by the Committee, and shall also advise the Committee of their own motion if it appears to them that, but for such advice, there is a possibility of a mistake being made in judging the medical significance of such information (including the absence of information) on any particular matter relevant to the fitness to practise of the practitioner.

6

If in any case referred to the Committee

• (a) the practitioner is a practitioner who was registered under Part III of the Act and the Committee do not include a member who was so registered, the President shall invite a member of the Council who was so registered to sit as an additional assessor with the Committee when they consider the case;

• (b) the practitioner is female, and neither the Committee not the medical assessors appointed under rules 16 or 32 include a woman, the President shall invite a female member of the Council, who is a registered medical practitioner, to sit as an additional assessor with the Committee when they consider the case.

SCHEDULE 3

Panel of members to assist the President

Signed

G. I. de Deney — Clerk of the Privy Council

Explanatory note

(This note is not part of the Order)

The Rules approved by this Order, which revoke and replace the General Medical Council Health Committee (Procedure) Rules 1980[^f00003], incorporate a number of drafting improvements and take account of the passing of the Medical Act 1983. In particular, the new Rules

• (a) specify more closely the role of the complainant in proceedings before the Council’s Health Committee;

• (b) provide for the appointment of medical supervisors to treat, and monitor the progress of, doctors whose fitness to practice has been called into question; and

• (c) clarify the procedure, including the rules of evidence, to be observed at hearings before the Committee.

Footnotes

[^f00001]: 1983 c. 54.

[^f00002]: Approved by S.I. 1980/859.

[^f00003]: Approved by S.I. 1980/859.