R (on the application of Maxwell) v The Office of the Independent Adjudicator for Higher Education [2011] EWCA Civ 1236, [2011] All ER (D) 232 (Oct)
The courts were not entitled to impose on the informal complaints review procedure of the Office of the Independent Adjudicator for Higher Education (OIA) a requirement that it had to adjudicate on issues such as whether or not there had been disability discrimination. Adjudication of that issue usually involved making decisions on contested questions of fact and law, which required the more stringent and structured procedures of civil litigation for their proper determination.
The OIA’s informal inquisitorial methods, which were normally conducted on paper without cross-examination and possibly leading to the making of recommendations in its final decision, meant that the outcome was not the product of a rigorous adversarial judicial process dealing with the proof of contested facts, with the application of the legislation to proven facts, with the establishment of legal rights and obligations and with the award of legal remedies, such as damages and declarations. It was contrary to the whole spirit of a scheme established for the free
