The Supreme Court has upheld an appeal by a surgeon, Pawan K Rajpal, against the High Court's refusal to set aside his suspension from the surgical department of Cavan General Hospital.
Because suspension without pay was punitive and with serious consequences, the failure of the chief executive officer of the North Eastern Health Board to consider, prior to imposing suspension, a dossier of documents containing Mr Rajpal's response to complaints against him by another surgeon, Dr William P Joyce, was not justifiable, the court held.
Mr Rajpal and Mr Joyce were suspended without pay from August 2003 until the suspensions were revoked by the Minister for Health last January. However, both objected to conditions placed on their return to work and have not returned to date.
The three-judge Supreme Court yesterday gave its reserved decision on appeals by both sides against parts of a High Court judgment given last year in the long-running dispute between the former North Eastern Health Board and Mr Rajpal, arising from difficulties within the surgical department at Cavan General Hospital.
Mr Rajpal had appealed against the High Court's decision of May 2004 which refused to set aside his suspension from the surgical department by the Minister for Health and Children.
The board appealed against the May 2004 judgment insofar as it set aside the decision of its chief executive, Paul Robinson, to request the Minister to set up an inquiry in relation to the doctor.
Delivering the Supreme Court judgment, Mr Justice Adrian Hardiman, with whom the Chief Justice, Mr Justice John Murray, and Ms Justice Susan Denham agreed, granted Mr Rajpal's appeal and dismissed the health board's appeal.
Mr Justice Hardiman said the dispute between Mr Rajpal and his employers arose from the difficult relationship which had developed between him and Mr Joyce.
This had led, from January to May 2003, to each consultant making allegations of a personal and professional nature against each other. This clearly represented a great difficulty for the surgeons themselves and for the management of the hospital.
The board and Mr Robinson had chosen to address these problems under particular statutory, regulatory and contractual provisions as involving the characterisation of Mr Rajpal's actions as amounting to, or possibly amounting to, misconduct or unfitness.