What a week!

All of a sudden, I have become terribly busy.  It is as if the regulators, like a slumbering bear, have awoken from their winter hibernation.  They are busy and now I am too.

This week was a marvellous week for my clients, in the midst of all of that business.  On Monday I had two clients asking for interim suspension orders to be lifted.  One, an allegation of sexual touching of a child.  The second, an allegation of improperly advocating a unproven course of treatment.  In the first, I had represented since the referral was made.  The second was a case where I had taken over representation from Thompsons, the union lawyers.  With the first, despite the interim order have been imposed, we had continued our own investigation and preparation - so when the order was reviewed, we had new and persuasive evidence to rely upon.  We successfully overturned the order and so that social worker is now free to work without restrictions.  With the second, in my view (and with respect to the previous representatives) the wrong approach had been taken prior to my involvement.  I advised a change of tack, and that change meant that the panel were happy to remove the suspension and impose a conditions of practice order that meant my client was immediately able to return to work.

That would have been enough for me to feel as though it had been a successful work.  But there was more.

I received notification on Tuesday of a successful no case to answer outcome at Case Examination for another of my clients.  Having prepared a very detailed argument as to why my client could not be found unfit to practice, we were very happy to see that the Case Examiners agreed with us in very short order.

There was more.

On Wednesday, one of my clients had a substantive order review.  At the end of their fitness to practice process, we had come to an agreed sanction of an 18 months conditions of practice order (which in itself was a really good result given the client's circumstances at that time - they were dismissed for misconduct just prior to the hearing!).  Now, we had the conditions of practice order to deal with and my client wanted to have an early review of the conditions.  I advised that such a review could be successful, and after having the client give evidence and making detailed submissions, the panel agreed.  The conditions of practice order was revoked with immediate effect - which again was a great result because the client had been dismissed (yet again!) just prior to the hearing.

All of these results showed the value in perseverance.  When clients come to me and say (as they often do), "my case is hopeless, I may as well give up", I tell them nonsense - let's get to work and get this sorted out.

My diary for next week is relatively clear, for the moment.  We will see what fate brings.