BDA tells GDC: ‘Step back or face legal challenge’
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- Published: Thursday, 04 September 2014 17:45
- Written by News Editor
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The British Dental Association (BDA) has submitted ‘damning’ evidence to the General Dental Council’s (GDC) fee rise consultation. It challenges the GDC’s financial case for demanding a massive increase in the annual retention fee (ARF). Mick Armstrong, Chair of the BDA Principal Executive Committee (PEC), said: “The GDC now face a simple choice: step back from this flawed fee rise, or face a legal challenge. We are confident in our arguments, and ready to take any and all action necessary to stop it”.
Video message from Mick Armstrong can be seen here.
The BDA has submitted an official response to the GDC’s consultation, including an independent financial analysis of the consultation document and other supporting information. It describes the conclusions in that report as unequivocal and urges the GDC to reconsider its proposal and revert to its established policy of 2010 which would permit a maximum rise in the ARF in line with inflation.
In its submission the BDA describes a litany of failings in the way the GDC has gone about its consultation and also condemns the assumptions it has used as the basis for attempting to justify the proposed rise. It has advised the GDC that if it does not recognise its miscalculation and fails to respond properly to it, the BDA will be forced into using the submission as the basis for a challenge by way of judicial review.
Mick Armstrong, Chair of the British Dental Association Principal Executive Committee, continued: “We have sought legal advice and as a consequence of that advice, threatened judicial review proceedings. Having heard our views, the GDC firmly rejected them and stood by its original proposals. We have commissioned independent experts to critically analyse the GDC’s consultation and those expert findings are utterly damning. We have been advised by our lawyers that the content is such that we would have a strong case to challenge the legitimacy and integrity of this consultation.
“If the GDC continues in its obstinate and obdurate rejection of our challenges, we are committed to seeing this through.What is really shocking is the fact that if it continues to resist this challenge, the GDC is using registrants’ money in its illogical and dogmatic battling – that damns the GDC still further. But it does not have to be too late. At what is now one minute to midnight we urge the GDC to see sense.”
Full press release and report on BDA website.
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