Not Black and White?: Disciplinary Regulation of Doctors Convicted of Child Pornography Offences in Australia

Between 2006–19, eight doctors who were registered to practise medicine in Australia were convicted of child pornography offences. Despite finding that those medical practitioners' conduct was extremely serious, disciplinary decision-makers permitted seven of them to continue or, after a period of suspension of their registration, return to practising medicine, albeit subject to conditions. The decision-makers whose reasons for decision are published indicated that they strove to achieve the appropriate objective of protecting the public, but they reached their determinations to some extent in different ways from one another and, in some instances, on the basis of matters that were unhelpful in identifying which determinations would best safeguard the community. Further, they did not all provide thorough, cogent reasons for their decisions. This article analyses the matters to which these decision-makers had regard. It then recommends that Australian legislatures and regulators of the medical profession provide guidance regarding decision-making in disciplinary proceedings where doctors have committed child pornography offences. These proposals seek to ensure that disciplinary decision-makers safeguard the community in a consistent manner, and assure the public and the medical profession that they have done so.