Doctor: Leave Granted to Appeal Out of Time
A doctor sought an application for an extension of time in which to challenge a decision of the Medical Practitioners Tribunal which was notified to her by email sent during business hours on Monday 18 December 2023: Moodliar v General Medical Council [2025] EWHC 913 (Admin) Pepperall J
The doctor acknowledged receipt of the email the following day. Section 40(4) of the Medical Act 1983 provided that a doctor could appeal to the court before the end of the period of 28 days beginning with the date on which notification of the decision was served.
As was required by s35E of the Act, the decision was sent with a covering letter from the MPTS informing the doctor of her right of appeal. The letter advised that the tribunal’s decision would be deemed to have been served on 22 December 2023 such that any appeal had to be lodged on or before 19 January 2024. It was common ground that was bad advice and that the period for appeal expired on 15 January. Nevertheless, ignorant of the mistake, and in reliance upon the MPTS’s letter, the doctor filed her appeal during court hours on 19 January 2024.
Whilst the time limit imposed by the Act was apparently absolute, s3 of the Human Rights Act 1998 required that s40(4) must be read down so as to confer a discretion or duty to extend time in exceptional circumstances where the strict application of the 28 day limit would impair the very essence of the statutory right of appeal. See: Adesina v. Nursing & Midwifery Council [2013] EWCA Civ 818, [2013] 1 W.L.R. 2156; Pomiechowski v. District Court of Legnica [2012] UKSC 20, [2020] 1 W.L.R. 1604; Stuewe v. Health & Care Professions Council [2022] EWCA Civ 1605, [2023] 4 WLR 7.
The issue of the MPTS misleading doctors as to the time limit for filing their appeals was not new. In both Gupta v. General Medical Council [2020] EWHC 38 (Admin) and Razoczy v. General Medical Council [2022] EWHC 890 (Admin) judges made clear that they would have been prepared to extend time had the doctors properly lodged their appeals in accordance with the advice given by the MPTS.
In Gupta, Julian Knowles J said he would “very likely” have granted an extension of time had Dr Gupta properly filed his appeal by the deadline that had wrongly been advised to him. He had not, however, done so. In Razoczy Fordham J took the same view but, as in Gupta, the doctor had failed to file his appeal by the time advised by the MPTS.
His Lordship agreed with the approach taken by the judges in those two cases that to refuse to extend time in a case where a doctor properly filed an appeal in accordance with the erroneous time calculations advised by the MPTS and was not otherwise at fault, would be to impair the very essence of the statutory right of appeal.
In the instant case, the doctor lodged her appeal in accordance with the advice given by the MPTS and his Lordship considered that this was one of those rare cases where the court should extend time.
Before leaving that aspect of the case his Lordship expressed his concern to Alexis Hearnden, counsel for the GMC, that the MPTS appeared to have something of a track record of incorrectly advising doctors of their appeal rights, and he was grateful that counsel had raised that matter with the GMC. Upon handing down judgment, the court was told that the MPTS had now changed its practice and henceforth intended only to send outcome letters by post thereby making it easier to advise doctors accurately as to the deadline for any appeal.
Despite time being extended, the doctor’s 14 grounds of appeal, described by his Lordship as a wide-ranging attack on the decision of the Tribunal, which grounds were grouped into seven principal areas of challenge, was dismissed.