Ms Linda Joyce

Preliminary Matters

Service

1. The Panel has seen an email dated 27 June 2024 sent by the HCPTS to the Registrant’s registered email address. This email notifies the Registrant of the date and time of today’s substantive review hearing and indicates that it will be conducted remotely. The Panel has also seen an email from Microsoft Outlook, also dated 27 June 2024, which indicates that the email has not been delivered to the Registrant’s registered email address.

2. The Panel has received and accepted legal advice. It has had in mind the case of R. v. Adeogba ([2016] EWCA Civ 162) which makes clear that the only obligation on the HCPC is to serve notice of this hearing using the email address which appears on the Register. The obligation to provide current contact details (email and postal address) is on the Registrant alone. The Panel is therefore satisfied that there has been good service in this case according to the Rules.

Proceeding in the absence of the Registrant

3. Ms Khan applied for the hearing to proceed in the absence of the Registrant. She submitted that all reasonable steps had been taken to notify the Registrant of the hearing. Those steps had included on 11 July 2024 sending a further email and the bundle of documents for the hearing, to the Registrant’s registered email address and by recorded post to her registered address. Ms Khan explained the process for sending post to registrants and informed the Panel that she had received a reference number which indicated that her letter and documents had been sent by recorded delivery to the Registrant’s registered address.

4. Ms Khan submitted that it was in the public interest and in accordance with the objective of public protection, for the mandatory review of the Suspension Order to proceed. Ms Khan submitted that an adjournment was unlikely to result in the Registrant’s attendance on a later date and, given that the Suspension Order was due to expire on 15 August 2024, it was unlikely that the HCPTS would be able to re-list the case before that date. Ms Khan submitted that there was no disadvantage to the Registrant in the case proceeding as she had not been asked by the previous panel to engage during the period of her suspension.

Decision

5. The Panel has received and accepted legal advice. It has considered Ms Khan’s submissions, and it has had in mind the guidance set out in the HCPTS Practice Note on Proceeding in the absence of the Registrant.

6. The Panel is satisfied that all reasonable steps have been taken to notify the Registrant of the hearing. Although the email notification of hearing dated 27 June 2024 was sent to an email address which was no longer in operation, further steps were taken to notify the Registrant of this hearing. Importantly, on 11 July 2024, she was sent the bundle of documents by post by the Presenting Officer, Ms Khan. This bundle included the notification of hearing letter dated 27 June 2024. In addition, on 24 July 2024, the Hearings Officer, sent an email to the Registrant at a private email account in her name in which she referred to today’s hearing and provided the link to allow the Registrant to attend today’s hearing.

7. The Panel has decided that it will proceed in the absence of the Registrant on the basis that she has voluntarily waived her right to attend, for the following reasons:

• that the notice of hearing letter informing the Registrant of the date and time of the hearing and that it would be held remotely and could proceed in her absence, was included in the bundle of documents sent to the Registrant on 11 July 2024.
• that this is a mandatory review hearing and therefore it is in the public interest that it proceeds as listed.
• that there has been no application by the Registrant for an adjournment and not only was it unlikely that the Registrant would attend on a later date, it was also unlikely that the case could be relisted before the date on which the Suspension Order is due to expire.
• that there is no disadvantage to the Registrant in not being present to either give evidence or make submissions as it is clear from the original determination that she was under no obligation to provide any further information for this review hearing.

Application to conduct part of the hearing in private

8. Ms Khan applied for part of the hearing to be conducted in private on grounds that there would be reference to the Registrant’s health.

9. In reaching its decision, the Panel has had in mind the HCPTS Practice Note on “Conducting Hearings in Private”. The Panel is mindful that substantive review hearings should be conducted in public. The Panel has concluded that the hearing may involve references to the Registrant’s health. In these circumstances, the Panel is satisfied that those parts of the hearing where reference to the Registrant’s health arise should be conducted in private to protect the Registrant’s private life.

Background

10. The Registrant is a Speech and Language Therapist (“SLT”) registered with the HCPC. She qualified as an SLT in 1998. At the time of her conviction, the Registrant was employed by York and Scarborough Teaching Hospital Foundation Trust (“the Trust”).

11. On 11 May 2021, the Registrant referred herself to the HCPC. She stated that she had been convicted of a drink-driving offence, describing the offence as, “drink driving whilst over the limit (the morning after the night before) and crashed into a lamppost on 28/02/21”.

12. The HCPC investigated the matter and obtained further information concerning the offence, namely that it had occurred mid-morning on 28 February 2021 when, at a roundabout, the Registrant had driven her car straight across the grass island. Examination of tyre marks indicated that she had made no attempt to drive around the roundabout. She had struck a lamppost which was then dragged under her car. No other person or vehicle had been involved. The Registrant’s car had been extensively damaged, and the Registrant suffered minor injuries for which she declined treatment. When the police arrived, the Registrant was fully cooperative and admitted that she had been driving the car. Having provided a specimen of breath at the scene which tested positive for the presence of alcohol, the Registrant was arrested and taken to a local police station. There she provided a further breath test which gave a reading of 99 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath. The legal limit is 35 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath. The Registrant was charged with the offence of drink-driving.

13. The Registrant pleaded guilty to that offence when she appeared at Humber Magistrates’ Court on 21 April 2021. She was fined £800, disqualified from driving for 25 months (a period which could be reduced by 25 weeks upon completion of an approved course), and some consequential costs order.

The Substantive hearing

14. On 17 and 18 January 2024, a panel of the HCPTS found the allegation and statutory ground proved. At the hearing, the panel was provided with a Memorandum of Conviction from Humber Magistrates’ Court and the Registrant admitted her conviction. The panel also found that the Registrant’s fitness to practise was impaired but only on the public component ground. The Registrant gave evidence on affirmation to the panel.

15. The panel was provided with documentary evidence to confirm that
she had satisfactorily completed the course which would entitle her to a reduction of 25 weeks in the length of her disqualification from driving.

16. The panel also had a report on the Registrant prepared by Dr Jonathan Ornstein, a Consultant dated 14 September 2023. The report had been obtained by an earlier panel in order to ascertain whether the case should be transferred to the Health Committee. In the event, the case was not transferred to the Health Committee, but the panel hearing the case in January 2024 was provided with a copy of Dr Ornstein’s report. The panel referred to various parts of the report in its determination, including Dr Ornstein’s opinion as to whether the Registrant’s medical condition affected her ability to practice…,

17. In relation to the personal component, the panel found the Registrant to be an honest witness who had gone from being a person who had practically no awareness of the state she had got herself into at the time of the incident in early 2021, to being a person with considerable awareness of, and insight into, her past behaviour. The panel found the Registrant to be remorseful and embarrassed. The panel agreed with the conclusions of Dr Ornstein and concluded that the Registrant’s level of insight was such that there was not an appreciable risk of repetition. The panel therefore found that the Registrant’s fitness to practise was not impaired on the personal component.

18. In relation to the public component, the panel made it clear that very different considerations applied. Whilst the panel noted that it was only dealing with one incident of drink-driving, it described that incident as being of the utmost seriousness. The Registrant had not been marginally over the legal limit; the level of alcohol in her system had been very nearly three times over the legal limit. She had driven for approximately 1 mile on a public road and had, therefore, created a very real risk that she could have caused life-changing injuries or death to other road users. It had been purely fortuitous that that had not occurred. The panel concluded that a fully informed and fair-minded member of the public would be appalled by that kind of behaviour on the part of a health professional. The panel decided that it would be failing in its duty to mark the seriousness of what had occurred were it not to find impairment on the public component. In addition to the public losing confidence in the SLT profession and in its regulation by the HCPC, proper professional standards would not be declared and upheld, and there would not be a sufficient deterrent effect on other registrants.

19. The panel found the following mitigating factors:
• the Registrant’s guilty plea, her engagement in the proceedings and her admission of the conviction;
• the Registrant’s genuine remorse;

20. The panel found the aggravating factors of the offence, namely the level of alcohol in the Registrant’s system which massively exceeded the legal limit and the driving which exposed members of the public and the Registrant herself, to a very real risk of physical harm. The panel also concluded that the seriousness of the aggravating factors outweighed the mitigating factors.

21. The panel imposed a six-month Suspension Order. It noted that the circumstances of the case met the criteria for such an order as set out in paragraphs 121 and 124 of the HCPC Sanctions Policy. Under paragraph 121 that the concerns represented a serious breach of the Standards of conduct, performance and ethics, the Registrant had insight, the issues were unlikely to be repeated and there was evidence to suggest that the Registrant was likely to be able to resolve or remedy their failings. Under paragraph 124 that a short period of suspension was appropriate where some action was required in order to maintain public confidence in the profession.

22. The panel stated in paragraph 32 that it was imposing a short period of suspension “not because it expects the Registrant to take active steps during the period of suspension to address the consequences of the conviction. Rather, a Suspension Order is imposed (as paragraph 124 of the Sanctions Policy makes clear it can be) because no lesser sanction would reflect the seriousness of the conviction, and therefore no lesser sanction would serve to maintain the required degree of confidence in the SLT profession or the regulation of it”.

Decision

23. This Panel has reviewed the HCPC bundle which totalled 22 pages and included documents relating to the service of notice of this hearing on the Registrant, and the original panel’s determination. No further evidence was provided by either party.

24. The Panel has also taken account of the HCPTS’s Practice Notes “Review of Article 30 Sanction Orders” and “Fitness to Practise Impairment” and has considered the submissions of Ms Khan for the Council. The Panel has received and accepted legal advice.

Submissions

25. Ms Khan indicated that the HCPC took a neutral stance on whether the Registrant’s fitness to practise remained impaired. Ms Khan reminded the Panel that there was a “persuasive” burden on the Registrant to show that her fitness to practise is no longer impaired on the public component but accepted that the original panel had not made any suggestions as to what the Registrant should do for this hearing.

Decision

26. The Panel noted that there was no new information before it which would indicate that the Registrant’s fitness to practise was impaired on the personal component. The original panel had decided that regarding her conviction, the Registrant had shown appropriate insight and genuine remorse, and it had judged the risk of repetition was low. The Panel was satisfied that there was no evidence before it which would suggest that the Registrant’s fitness to practise is impaired on the personal component.

27. In relation to the wider public interest (the public component), the Panel noted that the original panel decided that in order to mark the seriousness of the drink-driving conviction, a Suspension Order for a period of six months would be sufficient and proportionate in order to maintain public confidence in the SLT profession and in the HCPC as its regulator. The original panel also considered that such a sanction sent out a clear message to the public and the profession that such behaviour has regulatory consequences.

28. The Panel was satisfied that a reasonable and well-informed member of the public would not expect there to be a finding of impairment in the circumstances of this case, where the Registrant had: (i) pleaded guilty and been punished for the drink-driving offence; (ii) where the regulatory body had taken proceedings which had resulted in a finding of impairment and the seriousness of the conviction had been marked by the imposition of a Suspension Order for six months, and (iii) where there had been no repetition of the conduct that led to the conviction during the period of that Order. The Panel was therefore satisfied that the Registrant’s fitness to practise is no longer impaired on the public component.

29. The Panel considered whether to revoke the Suspension Order with immediate effect or to allow it to lapse on its expiry on 15 August 2024. The Panel decided that the Suspension Order should lapse when it expires on 15 August 2024. The original panel’s decision to impose a six-month Suspension Order would have been made in the knowledge that it would only come into effect on the expiry of 28 days from the date of its decision. That panel decided that six months was required to mark the seriousness of the conviction. The Panel agreed with the original panel’s reasoning that the period of six months is required in the wider public interest.

The Registrar is directed to revoke the Suspension Order of the registration of Ms Linda Joyce on expiry 15 August 2024.

No notes available

History of Hearings for Ms Linda Joyce