Introduction
Disciplinary powers over members are among the most basic and important forms of regulatory control. These powers can result in an offender being suspended from practice or even struck from the professional roll.
They are generally used only for more serious breaches of discipline and not for cases of poor or negligent service. The numbers of cases dealt with by disciplinary panels is often small compared with the numbers of complaints. They are also important because, although they are the tip of a disciplinary iceberg, the decisions set the standard of observance for practitioners.The ability of professions to command obedience, or to consciously socialise members to their norms, is itself an ethical issue. The decisions of professional disciplinary tribunals potentially deny a practitioner’s autonomy and deprive them of their livelihood. It is important therefore, that the decision is fair and procedurally defensible. Disciplinary tribunals operate in addition to the normal civil and criminal legal processes that apply to everyone else. The profession has often claimed that, because of the overlap of general and professional jurisdictions, the public enjoy double protection and the profession endures double jeopardy.
1 SJ Harris, quoted in M Teigh Bloom, The Trouble with Lawyers (New York, Simon and Schuster, 1968) at 157.
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