Davies v General Teaching Council for England

An appeal from a professional disciplinary body is ordinarily conducted by way of review. The court should interfere with factual findings only for an error of law. Specialist disciplinary panels are entitled to assess evidence and exercise professional judgment, including where evidence is hearsay or given by children, subject to fairness and appropriate caution. Their reasons need only enable the parties to understand why they won or lost. A sanction should be upheld only where the court is satisfied that the panel would have imposed it on the findings that remain. Where a sanction reflected more than one allegation and one finding is quashed, sanction should ordinarily be reconsidered by the disciplinary panel.

The appellant, a teacher, appealed under paragraph 6 of Schedule 2 to the Teaching and Higher Education Act 1998 and the General Teaching Council for England (Disciplinary Functions) Regulations 2001. The respondent’s Professional Conduct Committee found two allegations proved: inappropriate conduct during a school presentation and failure to respond appropriately to an injured pupil. It treated both as unacceptable professional conduct and imposed a reprimand remaining on the Register for two years.

The appellant challenged the factual findings, the fairness and evidential basis of the proceedings, the adequacy of the Committee’s reasons, and the sanction. The central issues were whether the finding concerning the presentation was adequately reasoned, whether the finding concerning the injured pupil was open to the Committee, and whether the sanction could stand after one allegation was quashed.

1. Appeal partly allowed. The respondent conceded that the Committee’s reasoning on the presentation allegation was inadequate. Fairness required reasons explaining why hearsay evidence and unsigned or undated pupil statements were preferred to the appellant’s oral evidence. That finding was quashed.
2. The appeal concerning the injured-pupil allegation was dismissed. The appeal was by way of review under CPR Rule 52.11, not a rehearing. The Committee was a specialist professional tribunal whose factual and professional judgments were entitled to considerable respect. The court could intervene only for an error of law.
3. The Committee was entitled to admit relevant evidence even if it would not have been admissible in a court of law. The absence of strict evidential rules did not remove the need for caution when considering hearsay evidence or evidence from children. The unsigned, undated pupil statements were admissible and their weight was for the Committee. The Committee was entitled to prefer the evidence of the experienced teacher who attended the classroom to the appellant’s account.
4. The Committee could have regard to the Employment Tribunal’s reasoned findings as evidence, particularly where the appellant had agreed to their inclusion and relied on them. Those findings were not binding and created no estoppel. The Committee nevertheless had to make its own findings, and nothing showed that it had improperly adopted the Employment Tribunal’s conclusions.
5. The Committee’s reasons were adequate on the injured-pupil allegation. A professional disciplinary body need not give elaborate reasons explaining why it accepted one witness and rejected another. Its reasons had to make clear why the parties had won or lost, and they did so.
6. The sanction could not remain in place automatically. It reflected the aggregate seriousness of both allegations, and the court was not satisfied that the Committee would have imposed the same reprimand on the injured-pupil allegation alone. Sanction was therefore remitted to the same Committee for reconsideration on that allegation alone. The presentation allegation was abandoned.

1. High Court (Administrative Court) — [2010] EWHC 2075 (Admin): appeal allowed in part. The finding on allegation 1 was quashed. The sanction was remitted to the same Professional Conduct Committee for reconsideration on allegation 5 alone.
2. Professional Conduct Committee of the General Teaching Council for England — decision dated 30 June 2009: allegations 1 and 5 were found proved, treated as unacceptable professional conduct, and sanctioned by a two-year reprimand.