Chief Constable of Thames Valley Police v Police Misconduct Panel

Not every failure to act with integrity by a police officer amounts to gross misconduct. Under the Police (Conduct) Regulations 2012, gross misconduct requires a breach so serious that dismissal would be justified. The assessment is for the misconduct panel, applying its experience and judgment to all the facts. A finding that conduct was serious, or involved a lack of integrity, does not make a lesser classification irrational.

A panel’s imprecise language will not invalidate its decision where its findings, reasoning and assessment of seriousness remain apparent and comprehensible. A Chief Constable may seek judicial review of a misconduct panel’s decision where the panel is sufficiently separate and independent, notwithstanding the Chief Constable’s role in appointing it.

The Chief Constable sought judicial review of a decision by a police misconduct panel concerning PC Mark White. The panel found that PC White had failed to return, record and properly dispose of a Ministry of Defence identity card. It found breaches of the Standards of Professional Behaviour, including a lack of integrity, but classified them as misconduct rather than gross misconduct and imposed a final written warning.

The Chief Constable challenged the decision on irrationality, cumulative assessment, misunderstanding of the statutory definitions and the finding of a lack of integrity. PC White also argued that the Chief Constable lacked capacity to challenge a decision of a panel appointed under the Police (Conduct) Regulations 2012. The issues were whether the classification was irrational and whether the Chief Constable could bring the claim.

The claim was dismissed on its merits, although the Chief Constable had capacity to bring it.

1. Severity and integrity. Deliberate dishonesty by a police officer would almost invariably amount to gross misconduct. A lapse of integrity is nevertheless capable of being less serious than dishonesty. Integrity in this context concerned failing to do the right thing or falling short of the standard expected of a wholly correct police officer. It did not inevitably require a finding of gross misconduct.
2. The panel was entitled to regard PC White’s conduct as very serious while concluding, in the exercise of its expertise and judgment, that it was not so serious that dismissal would be justified. The court was required to respect the panel’s factual findings and assessment of seriousness. The conclusion was not irrational.
3. The panel had dealt with the individual acts in stages, but each act remained part of the course of conduct considered as a whole. Its reasoning did not show that the allegations had been improperly severed.
4. The panel’s descriptions of misconduct, gross misconduct and dismissal lacked precision in places, but its overall findings and reasoning were apparent and comprehensible. The infelicities did not establish a misunderstanding of the governing definitions. The same applied to the finding that PC White lacked integrity.
5. Capacity. The Chief Constable was the appropriate authority under the Regulations and appointed the panel. However, the panel’s composition, including a legally qualified chair, a lay member selected through the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner and only one senior police officer, together with the public nature of the proceedings, demonstrated an intention that the disciplinary process should be independent and transparent. Following South Staffordshire NHS Trust v The Hospital managers of St George’s Hospital [2016] EWHC 1196 (Admin), the panel was sufficiently separate and independent to permit judicial review. This did not create an appeal against a lenient sanction; the irrationality threshold remained difficult to satisfy.

Not stated in the judgment.