R (on the application of Hill) v Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales

Catherine Callaghan represented the Institute in its successful defence of the judicial review claim brought by a chartered accountant, Mr Hill, in which he sought to challenge a decision of the Institute’s disciplinary tribunal ordering him to be excluded from membership of the Institute. Mrs Justice Lang DBE dismissed the claim for judicial review, upholding the Tribunal’s decision.

Mr Hill argued that the Tribunal’s decision was a nullity primarily because one panel member absented himself during Mr Hill’s cross-examination. The Institute argued in response that the temporary absence of a panel member, while unfortunate, did not deprive the Tribunal of jurisdiction to hear the disciplinary complaint and merely amounted to a procedural irregularity, which was capable of waiver. Any such procedural unfairness was waived on Mr Hill’s behalf by his solicitor’s consent to the temporary absence.

The decision contains important analysis on the difference between constitutive and adjudicative jurisdiction, the rule of natural justice that “he who decides the case must hear the case”, and the legal principles concerning waiver of procedural unfairness.