Nursing and Midwifery Council v Sekete

MR JUSTICE HOLMAN: This morning, on the application of the Nursing and Midwifery Council in case number 12138/2012, I dismissed their application on the basis that no advocate or representative of any kind appeared before the court at the listed time of 10.30 am, nor at any time up to 10.55 am when I finally concluded the matter.

This afternoon, counsel has appeared and given some sort of explanation for why he did not attend in court at the listed time of 10.30 am. It transpires that he has now come before the court only some hours later and still within the same day as I made and announced my earlier order totally to dismiss the application. It transpires that the court associate has not yet in fact drawn up that order, let alone sealed it. So it remains at the moment as an unperfected order, in written form only in my own handwriting on a piece of paper, and in oral form only on the record of what I have said this morning. In those circumstances, I consider that I do have a power to set aside even so fundamental an order as I made this morning and substitute a different order within the same working day.

The essential facts of this matter are that the Nursing and Midwifery Council are investigating allegations of misconduct on the part of a registrant, Martha Sekete. The incidents in question are said to have happened during November 2009. For reasons which are not relevant to today, there seems to have been a long delay in investigating that matter, but at all events during 2012 a Conduct and Competence Committee of the Nursing and Midwifery Council embarked upon a formal hearing to consider the charges against the registrant. That process began on two days during March 2012, at which the registrant was present and in which she participated. Unfortunately, the committee could not conclude the hearing in March and effectively adjourned it part heard to two days in July 2012.

In late June, the registrant notified the Nursing and Midwifery Council that she needed to go urgently to South Africa following a bereavement, and in those circumstances the Nursing and Midwifery Council decided to adjourn the matter. It was restored to some further dates in November 2012 when, however, she did not appear, nor, as I understand it, send any message explaining her absence. The Conduct and Competence Committee nevertheless decided that they would not continue with the hearing at that stage, but have instead further adjourned it to two more days on 10 and 11 January 2013.

There was an interim suspension order made back in June 2011 for 18 months which will expire, therefore, in December 2012. In the circumstances that I have just described, that would have the effect that the interim suspension order had come to an end before these proceedings could be concluded. So the Nursing and Midwifery Council have made an application to the High Court pursuant to statutory provisions for a further extension of the interim supervision order.

In the circumstances that I have described, much of the responsibility for the delay (I do not use the word "fault" or "blame") must lie upon the registrant herself. In those circumstances, I will make an order extending the interim suspension order for a further period until 11 March 2013.

Mr Hunt, you must go away and amend your draft order to delete the reference to Sales J and insert my name, and then lodge it by email or in some other way with today's associate and that can then be sealed and will be the order.

MR HUNT: My Lord, I am most grateful, and once again, my Lord, I apologise for any inconvenience caused by the delay this morning.