The Court of Final Appeal (CFA) refused leave to appeal in Dr Chu Kin Wah v. The Medical Council of Hong Kong [2026] HKCFA 29, in a decision addressing an important procedural question for disciplinary tribunals: how far does a duty of “due inquiry” require a panel to go in managing the evidence before it?
Case Summary
Dr Chu challenged findings of professional misconduct made by an Inquiry Panel of the Medical Council. The point of wider interest was not whether other doctors’ contemporaneous management of the same patient was irrelevant, but whether the Panel was required to summon those doctors or otherwise take further steps on its own motion.
Key Legal Issue
The CFA considered whether the statutory duty of “due inquiry” or due investigation required the Inquiry Panel to call other doctors as witnesses where Dr Chu was legally represented, had relied on materials concerning those doctors, and had adduced expert evidence in support of his case.
Court Findings
The CFA refused leave to appeal. Key findings included:
- The Panel had taken the materials concerning the other doctors’ management into account, but was entitled to decide what weight to give them in light of the other evidence (§5).
- What a single other doctor did or did not do could hardly constitute a responsible body of medical opinion supporting Dr Chu’s management (§6).
- There was no reasonably arguable ground for saying that the Panel had a duty to summon the other doctors as witnesses (§8).
- The CFA held that it was for Dr Chu and those advising him to consider whether calling those doctors would assist his case (§8).
- The duty of due investigation did not require the Panel to take over the conduct of the evidence in those circumstances (§8).
Key Takeaways
The decision is a useful reminder of the boundary between a disciplinary panel’s duty to conduct a due inquiry and a represented practitioner’s responsibility for the conduct of their own evidence. A panel may need to consider relevant materials placed before it, but that does not necessarily mean it must call additional witnesses or step into the role of the practitioner’s legal team.
Read the Court of Final Appeal judgment here: https://legalref.judiciary.hk/lrs/common/ju/ju_frame.jsp?DIS=184503&currpage=T
Mr Martin Kok acted for the Respondent.
Mr Jiang Zixin (led by Mr Anthony Neoh SC, and with Mr Andrew Mak and Ms Barbara Wong), acted for the Applicant.
