Legislation

Hi Jim

So good to see you back!! I do hope that you are well enough to be posting and not overdoing things though.

I was wondering if you would be so kind as to give me your expert advice with regards to the law. My son's DLA tribunal was adjourned as the panel wanted to write to 2 out of my son's 3 consultants for further information. At the time, they said that we had no say in the matter. I guessed what the Chairman said was wrong but I didn't want to argue. A week later, the tribunal sent my son a letter requesting his authorisation for them to request further information. We have nothing to hide, so he did as they requested. I was annoyed though as I didn't speak up at the tribunal and tell the Chairman he was arrogant and ill informed on the law of disclosure.

Anyway, we have received copies of the information requested and we were really pleased with their factual reports which support what we have been saying all along. Moreoever, we cannot be accused of coercing the Consultants as we didn't even inform them that we had put in a claim for DLA let alone inform them that the Tribunal would be writing to them.

Sorry Jim, I am going around the houses here and not getting to the point. OK, we received a letter from the Tribunal giving us a date for the next hearing. A week later, we receive another one to say that it had been postponed on account that the GP on the Panel knows the GP who did my son's ESA medical. The point is, this panel GP is the same GP who sat on the panel at the first hearing, was privy to my son's notes and made a decition with the other 2 members to write to my son's Consultants. Therefore, he saw the report by the GP (his friend) who conducted the ESA medical at that time. Should my son fail his appeal and we took it to a Higher Tribunal, would this be a point of law we could argue.

Regards

Kaz

Hi Kaz,

As far as I can remember, and it's 5 years since I sat on a DLA Tribunal, if the medical member has previous knowledge of the claimant, e.g. they have examined them previously, or have been involved with them for a different benefit, in this case ESA, they shouldn't be allowed to sit on a DLA Tribunal.

However, maybe things have changed in this respect, so perhaps our moderator Crazydiamond, who was an Adjudicating Officer for the former DSS ( now of course the DWP, with cases being decided by a Decision Maker) could confirm whether or not I'm right.

Best wishes.

Jim

Jima1 wrote:

Hi Kaz,

As far as I can remember, and it's 5 years since I sat on a DLA Tribunal, if the medical member has previous knowledge of the claimant, e.g. they have examined them previously, or have been involved with them for a different benefit, in this case ESA, they shouldn't be allowed to sit on a DLA Tribunal.

However, maybe things have changed in this respect, so perhaps our moderator Crazydiamond, who was an Adjudicating Officer for the former DSS ( now of course the DWP, with cases being decided by a Decision Maker) could confirm whether or not I'm right.

Best wishes.

Jim

Hi Jim,

You are absolutely correct in your assessment of the situation.

Regards,

CD

Hi CD,

Many thanks for jogging my memory.

Kind regards.

Jim

Thank you Jim and Crazydiamond for your speedy replies but in view of your replies, on evaluation, I think my post is confusing.

The situation is that the tribunal has postponed the hearing on account that the medical tribunal member was found to be a friend of the ATOS doctor who conducted the LCWRA with my son. However, this is like shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted. The reason why I say this is that he sat through the first tribunal hearing and was privy to my sons notes which included the report from his GP friend the LCWRA examiner. Therefore, seeing as the tribunal have quite rightly seen fit to postpone the hearing until they find a replacement, surely they should have adjourned for the same reasons during the first hearing. Would we have a legal argument here if it went to a higher tribunal?

Many thanks

Kaz

Dragon wrote:

Thank you Jim and Crazydiamond for your speedy replies but in view of your replies, on evaluation, I think my post is confusing.

The situation is that the tribunal has postponed the hearing on account that the medical tribunal member was found to be a friend of the ATOS doctor who conducted the LCWRA with my son. However, this is like shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted. The reason why I say this is that he sat through the first tribunal hearing and was privy to my sons notes which included the report from his GP friend the LCWRA examiner. Therefore, seeing as the tribunal have quite rightly seen fit to postpone the hearing until they find a replacement, surely they should have adjourned for the same reasons during the first hearing. Would we have a legal argument here if it went to a higher tribunal?

Many thanks

Kaz

In my opinion, the first tribunal should not have taken place precisely for the reasons you have given.

As a further tribunal has been arranged with a different medical member, this in fact renders the first tribunal as irrelevant. The tribunal albeit belatedly, have realised that there could have been some conflict of interest, so in effect they have corrected the abnormality.

I was involved with a similar position but it involved a tribunal chairman. The chairman realised that he had conducted a previous hearing, and therefore decided to adjourn the hearing. He may or may not have read the case papers, but when the rearranged hearing took place with a different chairman, which incidentally I lost, when I appealed to the SS Commissioners (as they were then), I didn't raise the issue of the first tribunal being adjourned, as I believed there was no basis to identify an error of law.

I hope this explains the situation more clearly for you?