Evans, R (On the Application Of) v Cheshire Constabulary

Where a medical practitioner has made a final decision that a police officer is disabled and that the disablement is likely to be permanent, that decision is binding when entitlement to an injury pension is later considered. The binding decision includes the essential reasons supporting it, including the relevant diagnosis. A later medical authority must therefore address causation and degree of disablement on the clinical hypothesis that the earlier diagnosis and disablement were correct. It cannot reopen whether permanent disablement exists or substitute a different diagnosis. The requirement gives police officers a substantial degree of certainty in pension entitlement and applies equally to injury pensions and disablement pensions.

The claimant, a former police officer, had been found by an SMP in 2007 to be disabled from performing the ordinary duties of a police officer because of mechanical back pain and post-traumatic stress disorder, and that disablement was likely to be permanent. After his retirement, his application for an injury pension under the Police (Injury Benefit) Regulations 2006 was considered by another SMP and then by the PMAB. The PMAB rejected the claim after finding that the claimant had no permanent disablement and did not have the diagnoses relied upon by the earlier SMP.

The claimant challenged the PMAB’s decision on the basis that regulation 30(2) made the earlier decisions binding. The central issue was whether the PMAB could reconsider the existence and medical basis of the claimant’s permanent disablement.

1. Claim allowed and decision quashed. The PMAB had failed to give effect to the binding effect of the earlier SMP decision.
2. On the proper construction of regulation 30(2) of the Police (Injury Benefit) Regulations 2006, a final decision under regulation H1(2) of the Police Pensions Regulations 1987 that a person is disabled and that the disablement is likely to be permanent is binding for the purposes of deciding entitlement to an injury pension. The statutory language does not permit a distinction between a disablement pension and an injury pension.
3. The binding effect extends beyond the bare answers to questions (a) and (b). Regulation 30(6), by requiring the decision to be expressed in a report, makes the decision and its essential supporting reasons indivisible. The diagnosis underpinning the earlier decision was therefore also binding.
4. The later SMP or PMAB must answer questions (c) and (d)—whether the disablement resulted from an injury received in the execution of duty and the degree of disablement—on the clinical hypothesis that the earlier SMP’s diagnosis and findings were correct. Degree of disablement requires a backward-looking assessment by reference to the injury and the relevant date, subject to later review under regulation 37.
5. The reasoning of Laws LJ in Laws supported this construction. The requirement of finality applies to the essential judgment or judgments supporting the decision and reflects the legislative purpose of certainty in police injury pensions. The court declined to follow the contrary approach in Doubtfire.
6. The PMAB had instead reconsidered whether permanent disablement existed and had failed to address questions (c) and (d) by reference to Dr Hutton’s binding findings. The power under section 31 of the Senior Courts Act 1981 to refuse relief where the outcome would inevitably be the same did not apply, because the PMAB’s lawful task was materially different from the task it had undertaken.

First-instance judicial review proceedings. The defendant’s decision was quashed.