Rak-Latos v The General Dental Council

In a professional disciplinary appeal, a conviction for serious criminal conduct may be taken at face value, even where the conviction was obtained abroad and the domestic evidential rule does not directly apply. A registrant cannot use disciplinary proceedings to mount a collateral challenge to the conviction or advance an inconsistent account.

Fitness to practise may be impaired by serious criminal conduct outside professional practice, particularly where the conduct involved intent, failure to report the conviction and lack of insight. An appellate court should be slow to interfere with a specialist committee’s evaluative sanction decision. Erasure may be proportionate where the conduct represents a serious departure from professional standards, abuse of professional trust and persistent dishonesty.

The appellant, a dentist, was convicted in Poland of aiding and abetting prescription fraud and received a suspended sentence of imprisonment. She did not report the conviction to the General Dental Council after moving to England and practising there.

The Professional Conduct Committee found that she had been convicted of the offence, had failed immediately to report it, and had acted misleadingly, although it rejected dishonesty in the reporting failure. It found her fitness to practise impaired and directed erasure from the register.

The appeal under section 29 of the Dentists Act 1984 challenged the finding of misconduct, the finding of current impairment and the proportionality of erasure.

1. Appeal dismissed. The committee was entitled to find misconduct in the failure to report a conviction for aiding and abetting prescription fraud. The appellant’s ill-health and possible confusion about the reporting obligation had been taken into account. The reporting ground was in any event academic in light of the conclusions on impairment and sanction.
2. The court adopted the approach to section 29 appeals summarised in Wasu v The General Dental Council [2013] EWHC 3782 (Admin). The appeal is by way of rehearing, but appropriate weight must be given to the specialist tribunal’s expertise. The court should be slow to interfere with factual and evaluative findings, subject to correction where the decision was wrong or unjust because of serious procedural or other irregularity.
3. The committee was entitled to take the Polish conviction at face value. Although rules 57(5)–(6) of the General Dental Council (Fitness to Practise) Rules Order of Council 2006 did not apply directly to a foreign conviction, the appellant could not use the disciplinary proceedings to challenge the conviction or present an inconsistent account. The reasoning in Shepherd v The Law Society [1996] EWCA Civ 977, Kirk v The Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons [2004] UKPC 4 and The General Medical Council v Spackman [1943] A.C. 627 supported that approach.
4. The conviction involved intentional assistance in prescription fraud over six years. Considering its seriousness, the failure to report it and the appellant’s lack of insight, the finding of current impairment was justified. Misconduct may occur outside professional practice where it is morally culpable or disgraceful and brings the profession into disrepute, as explained in R (Remedy UK Ltd) v The General Medical Council [2010] EWCA Civ 1245.
5. Erasure was an evaluative judgment within the committee’s proper discretion. Applying Bawa-Garba v The General Medical Council [2018] EWCA Civ 1879, the court should interfere only for an error of principle or where the decision fell outside the bounds of what the committee could properly and reasonably decide. Serious departure from professional standards, abuse of trust in the issuing of blank prescriptions and persistent dishonesty justified erasure.

High Court (Administrative Court): Appeal under section 29 of the Dentists Act 1984 dismissed. The Professional Conduct Committee’s findings of misconduct and current impairment, and its direction for erasure, were upheld.