General Osteopathic Council removes Elizabeth Treadaway from its Register of osteopaths
7 March 2019
The GOsC’s Professional Conduct Committee (PCC) has found that Ms Elizabeth Treadaway, who practised in Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire, had been guilty of unacceptable professional conduct. The PCC decided, at its hearing on 5 February 2019, that the appropriate sanction would be to remove Ms Treadaway’s name from the Register of osteopaths.
The allegation considered by the PCC was that Ms Treadaway had failed to engage with the GOsC’s fitness to practise process by failing to respond to correspondence.
In May 2016, Ms Treadaway was suspended from the Register for four months for failing to obtain and maintain professional indemnity insurance. The suspension order was reviewed in September 2016. Ms Treadaway did not attend, and was not represented at, the review hearing.
The PCC noted that there was no evidence of continued insight or remediation by Ms Treadaway and that she had not engaged with her regulator since the hearing in May 2016.
The PCC decided to extend the suspension order for a further eight months. The suspension order was reviewed again on two occasions, in April 2017 and in March 2018. During this period, Ms Treadaway did not respond to any communication from the GOsC or attend the review hearings.
At each hearing the PCC decided to extend the suspension order. At the hearing on 5 February 2019, the PCC noted that there is a duty on registered professionals to engage with and cooperate with their regulator. The PCC found that there was a duty on Ms Treadaway to respond to the correspondence that had been sent to her by the GOsC since May 2016 and that she had failed to do so.
The PCC, chaired by Mark Osborne, took the view that Ms Treadaway’s continued failure to engage with her regulator amounted to unacceptable professional conduct. In its view, it was a grave matter not to have engaged with the GOsC’s regulatory processes for more than two years.
In deciding on the appropriate sanction, the PCC considered that Ms Treadaway’s persistent lack of engagement was fundamentally incompatible with registration. The PCC determined that Ms Treadaway’s name should be removed from the statutory Register of osteopaths.
Ms Treadaway is now unable to practise as an osteopath.
