JG v Kent and Medway NHS & Social Care Partnership Trust: [2019] UKUT 187 (AAC)
Upper Tribunal Administrative Appeals Chamber decision by Judge Ramshaw on 11 June 2019.
Read the full decision in .
Judicial Summary
Mental Health First-tier Tribunal – Judicial Bias – Apparent bias - Breach of Natural Justice – Procedural Irregularity. Where a First-tier Tribunal judge undertook non-legal research by accessing a court of appeal judgment in respect of the appellant, did this lead to a presumption of bias and automatic disqualification? Did it lead to a conclusion of a real possibility of bias? Whether so doing amounts to a procedural irregularity leading to a breach of natural justice in that it rendered the hearing unfair. In the circumstances appertaining there can be no presumption of bias leading to automatic disqualification. On the facts of the case there was no real possibility of bias. Undertaking the non-legal research was a procedural irregularity but on the facts the hearing was not unfair.