Meetings and hearings

The Fitness to Practise Committee holds meetings and hearings to consider fitness to practise matters.

About the committee

The committee is a three person panel, one of whom is a nurse, a midwife or a nursing associate. The panel can hear matters at a meeting or a hearing, and has the same powers whether the matter is considered at a hearing or a meeting.

Find out who sits on our panels.

Dealing with cases at meetings and hearings

Once the case examiners have sent a case to be dealt with by a committee, we’ll write to the nurse, midwife or nursing associate and give them 28 days to tell us if they would like their case to be dealt with at a hearing or a meeting.

We’ll arrange for the case to be heard at a meeting if the nurse, midwife or nursing associate requests this, or if they don’t tell us what they would prefer, or has no contact with us.

We’ll only arrange for a case to be heard at a hearing if a nurse, midwife or nursing associate has asked for one, or if we think there is a ‘material dispute’. A material dispute is a disagreement between us and the nurse, midwife or nursing associate about an important issue in the case.