Press Round-Up: Regulatory and Professional Discipline - December 2022 - January 2023

Healthcare

General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC)

In November 2022, the GPhC met with key stakeholders across the pharmacy sector to discuss racism in pharmacy and the impact on patient care.

The GPhC has now published  roundtable report entitled “Racism in pharmacy: report on the roundtable event”  which includes highlights from external speakers and GPhC staff, as well as a summary of the points raised by stakeholders during the meeting.

The roundtable report also presents an overview of the work that the GPhC has already undertaken in line with their Equality, Diversity and Inclusion strategy: “Delivering equality, improving diversity and fostering inclusion: our strategy for change”. The strategy, published in 2021, sets out a framework for how the GPhC will embed considerations of equality, diversity and inclusion in all aspects of its work as a regulator.

 

General Medical Council (GMC)

The GMC’s Chair, Professor Dame Carrie MacEwen, has issued a message to the medical profession.

The Chair’s full message to doctors can be found - here

The take home points from the message are:

1. The GMC remains committed to taking into account the exceptional circumstances currently faced by doctors (including those caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, staff shortages, lack of space and patient delays to unserviceable demand), should a concern be raised about their fitness to practise.
2. Doctors are encouraged to record the decisions they are taking in the context of the extraordinary pressures they are currently facing.

This second point is particularly important. As a doctor, if your decision making, treatment or care of a patient has been influenced by exceptional pressures, making a written record of what those pressures were and impact they had will put you in a much stronger position if you are later challenged on them by the GMC.

 

General Dental Council (GDC)

The GDC has published a policy position statement on dual registration requirements for oral and maxillofacial surgeons (OMFS) and other regulated healthcare professionals.

The position statement explains why dual registration with both the GDC and the GMC is required for oral and maxillofacial surgeons. It is also relevant for other healthcare professionals who require dual registration, for example appropriately qualified clinical scientists (such as maxillofacial prosthetists or reconstructive scientists) who are registered with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC).

The purpose of the position statement is to ensure that the appropriate regulatory safeguards are in place to protect patient safety, support effective patient care, and reduce the risk of harm.

The position statement also explains the legal framework around the “medical task” exemption. This specifies that professionals who are qualified and registered with one of the eight other statutory healthcare professional regulators can perform “medical tasks” without GDC registration that would otherwise be the practice of dentistry. A “medical task” means a task carried out as part of the delivery of clinical care, for example assisting in an operating theatre or making a prosthesis.

The position statement sets out practical examples to help medical professionals consider how they should use their judgement to determine whether they can rely on the medical task exemption or whether they require GDC registration. For example, as part of a wider course of medical clinical care, an oral and maxillofacial surgeon who carries out an extraction on a patient does not need GDC registration as the extraction has been undertaken as a medical task.

The GDC’s position statement can be found - here  

 

Legal

Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA)

The SRA has submitted a rule change application to the Legal Services Board (LSB) to make amendments to the SRA’s Standards and Regulations relating to health and wellbeing at work.

The first set of changes (the ‘fair treatment changes’) are additions to the SRA’s Code of Conduct for Solicitors, RELs and RFLs and the Code of Conduct for Firms. The proposed changes are intended to set out the SRA’s expectations on the appropriate treatment of work colleagues by the individuals and firms that the SRA regulates. The proposed changes include requirements in the Code of Conduct to treat colleagues with fairness and respect and not to bully or harass them or discriminate unfairly against them. Additionally, there is a requirement for those with management responsibility to challenge behaviours that do not meet this standard and for law firms to ensure employees meet this standard.

The second set of changes (the ‘health and fitness to practise changes’) are to the SRA’s Assessment of Character and Suitability Rules and the Authorisation of Individuals Regulations. The changes are intended to clarify the SRA’s approach to issues around solicitors’ health and fitness to practise. Their purpose is to support the SRA’s ability to take appropriate and proportionate action, where necessary, to deal with concerns over a solicitor’s health affecting their fitness to practise.  

The SRA’s application can be found – here  

 

Bar Standards Board (BSB)

The BSB has published its annual report on Diversity at the Bar, summarising the latest available data collected.  The report makes for difficult reading. It concludes that, overall, there has been no substantial change in the reported profile of the Bar since 2021. The ICAEW’s phrase “male, pale and stale” springs to mind.

The percentage of barristers from minority ethnic backgrounds at the Bar has increased just 0.5% since December 2021 to 16.3%. Barristers from Black/Black British backgrounds are still underrepresented at 3.4% of the Bar compared to 3.8% in the working age population as a whole.

As of December 2022, women constituted 39.7% of the Bar compared to an estimate of 50.2% of the UK working age population.

Whilst the proportion of female KCs has increased year on year from 18.1% to 19.2% (when excluding non-responses), there is still a large disparity between the proportion of the Bar who are female and the proportion of KCs who are female (39.7% vs 19.2%).

There remains an underrepresentation of disabled practitioners at the Bar. Although there was a low response rate of 62.7%, 7.3% of those who provided information on disability status disclosed a disability. This is much lower than an estimate of 15.8% for the percentage of the employed working age UK population with a declared disability as defined by the Equality Act 2010.

Perhaps one of the most striking features of the report is the low response rate of the Bar in relation to certain categories. Whilst responses have increased year-on-year, the rate of increase is slowing down for many of the categories monitored. Less than 60% of the Bar responded to monitoring questions relating to:

• Their caring responsibilities for others;
• Whether they were the first generation to attend university,
• Their gender identity, and
• Their religion or belief.

The importance of diversity monitoring cannot be overstated. It is critical to opening our eyes to bias and identifying potential issues that may be preventing certain groups of people from progressing in their careers. When response rates are low,  meaningful data analysis is difficult and this adversely impacts the ability to measure whether there have been improvements in diversity and inclusion. Barristers are strongly encouraged to complete all sections of the BSB’s diversity questionnaire which is issued

The report can be found - here

 

Education - students

Each year, the General Medical Council (GMC) and Medical Schools Council run a professionalism competition which is open to UK medical students. This year, students were invited to produce an online resource for medical students on how to use social media safely and professionally based on the GMC’s Achieving Good Medical Practice. Students could create a social media post, podcast or blog to offer advice on challenges they may encounter in their professional life.

The competition was won by a team of fifth year medical students at the University of Leister Medical School who created an animated YouTube video which can be found - here

The video sets out common scenarios that medical students might encounter when using social media and how to handle these appropriate. Examples included:

• Being mindful of what you say on private WhatsApp group chats

It is, in our experience, very common for a University disciplinary investigation to be triggered by a message that a student has sent to friends, housemates or classmates in a private WhatsApp group chat.  As a general rule: if you wouldn’t say it to your tutor’s face, don’t put it on the group chat.

• Advertising a product on social media

Social media “influencing” as a second source of income is becoming increasingly common for doctors and students. It is essential that any advertising is factually accurate, not misleading and comes with appropriate warnings.

• Responding to online trolling

Often an innocuous social media post can attract trolling and, in the heat of the moment, it is tempting to post a response. It is essential for students to stop and think before responding. Would you be comfortable with your tutors or the doctors on your placement seeing your response?  Could your response bring the medical profession into disrepute?

All medical students (and indeed all doctors) would be well advised to watch the YouTube video as it contains very useful information on common pitfalls to avoid.

Also shortlisted in the competition was four Fourth Yes medical students from the University of Liverpool Medical School. These students created a Social Media Guidance for Medical Students website which can be found  - here

The website summarises the key learning points from Achieving Good Medical Practice and separates them into four domains in a similar format to Good Medical Practice (the GMC’s ethical guidance for doctors).

The four domains are: confidentiality, anonymity, maintaining professional boundaries and respect for colleagues. Within each domain, examples of challenges medical students might encounter are given and information is provided on how to deal with these. There is also a quiz on the website to consolidate the knowledge gained.

The website is an extremely valuable resource for medical students and has been endorsed by the GMC.

Finance

Financial Reporting Council (FRC)

The FRC has launched a research project, led by BritainThinks, on gender imbalance among UK qualified actuaries.

The objective of the research projects are to:

1. Gather and assess primary evidence on the reasons for gender imbalances among senior actuaries.
2. Assess the barriers/disincentives for women to progress towards senior actuarial positions. Are there consistent themes to such barriers? At what point(s) in a person’s career path do the identified barriers tend to be most often experienced?
3. Identify (and document) cases where good practice has supported women’s progression to senior positions in the actuarial profession.

BritainThinks is looking to conduct confidential interviews with actuaries and former actuaries at all levels as part of the research project. To take part in the research, contact:

actuarialresearch@britainthinks.com

Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW)

The ICAEW has welcomed the launch of a Government Treasury consultation on plans to regulate crypto asset activities in an effort to improve market integrity and consumer protection by setting out a proposed crypto market abuse regime.  The consultation, ‘Future financial services regulatory regime for cryptoassets’ will close on 30 April 2023 and can be found - here

The ICAEW has also created a very helpful Insights In Focus podcast: ‘How can accountants make sense of crypto’ - https://www.icaew.com/insights/podcast/how-can-accountants-make-sense-of-crypto