A recent decision from the High Court in Chief Constable of Thames Valley v Police Misconduct Panel [2017] EWHC 923 (Admin) says that misconduct panels can now be judicially reviewed by Chief Constables – but gives rise to a number of new and potentially awkward questions.
Whether a Chief Constable had standing to apply for judicial review against a decision of a misconduct hearing panel had not, until now, been a question that anyone wanted to ask. Before the recent advent of legally qualified chairs, hearings were presided-over by either an Assistant Chief Constable (ACC) or a Deputy Chief Constable. Plainly, it would have been (almost) unthinkable for a Chief Constable to seek to bring a judicial review against a decision that one of their own chief officers had made.