Jul 13 2006
The General Medical Council (GMC) in the UK is questioning the role of expert witnesses in court.
The GMC is challenging in the Court of Appeal a ruling that says expert witnesses are immune from disciplinary action.
The High Court ruling states that expert witnesses who mistakenly give flawed evidence should be immune from disciplinary action by their profession's regulatory bodies unless requested to do so by a judge.
The ruling was given in February by Mr Justice Collins when he overturned a GMC ruling that Sir Roy Meadow was guilty of serious professional misconduct that resulted in the retired paediatrician being struck off the medical register.
Professor Meadow gave evidence at the trial of Sally Clark, who was arrested in 1998 after the deaths of her two sons, Christopher and Harry; she was wrongfully convicted for the murder of her sons.
At the time Meadow told a Chester Crown Court jury there was a "1 in 73 million" chance of two children dying from cot deaths in an affluent family.
Mrs Clark's conviction was later quashed in the Court of Appeal on grounds unrelated to Professor Meadow's evidence.
The regulatory body said Meadow had given his evidence in good faith but had strayed outside the area of his expertise.
Collins said that laws protecting expert witnesses from negligence or defamation claims also protected them from disciplinary proceedings which could discourage them from giving evidence.
But some lawyers disagree and say that witnesses who act in good faith will not be punished for making mistakes but for inappropriate conduct.
Earlier this week the Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith, intervened in the case, and told the Court of Appeal that regulatory bodies, not courts, should decide whether action should be taken against an expert witness who has given faulty evidence.
Goldsmith says the public needs protection from witnesses who stray beyond their area of expertise.
The appeal hearing closed this week with a judgment expected later this year.