The Court of Appeal has upheld the High Court's decision that the right to a fair hearing under Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights was not engaged during disciplinary proceedings that ultimately led to the dismissal of an NHS hospital consultant for gross misconduct.

Although the right to practise a profession and the right to a reputation have been described as civil rights potentially engaging Article 6, an employer that dismisses an employee is not determining a civil right, but exercising a contractual power. Any civil rights could then be determined by a tribunal or court hearing an unfair dismissal or breach of contract claim, or (in the case of a doctor) by the General Medical Council determining fitness to practise.

A majority of the court also held that the Court of Appeal's obiter remarks on Article 6 in Kulkarni v Milton Keynes Hospital, which were a "lynch-pin" of the claimant's arguments in this case, were wrong (Mattu v Univeristy Hospitals of Coventry and Warwickshire NHS Trust [2012] EWCA Civ 641.)