question for Etienne/Sally-Anne

Guest400 · Post by **Guest400** » Mon Apr 23, 2007 10:04 am

Well, my appeal submission finally went in today, I was still changing it slightly at 8am this morning! I was wondering, do you think the decision is actually more or less made between now and the appeal hearing? Surely they must decide which appeals are worthy and which aren't at this stage? What do you two think?

Post by **Etienne** » Mon Apr 23, 2007 1:51 pm

Guest400 wrote:Well, my appeal submission finally went in today, I was still changing it slightly at 8am this morning! I was wondering, do you think the decision is actually more or less made between now and the appeal hearing? Surely they must decide which appeals are worthy and which aren't at this stage?

No! ( ..... Just a quick response in the lunch break .....

)

See the Q&As, D1.
There is absolutely no truth in the suggestion that a panel would have “made up its mind” beforehand. Having been present at very many appeals, I never once met a panel member who arrived with a closed mind. Of course, panel members are required to read all the papers in advance, will have noted any weak or strong points about the case, and will want to test the arguments. But what was striking was how often one could be swayed during the course of a hearing, or how agonising the final decision could be. The most unsatisfactory cases were those where parents (for whatever reason) were unable to attend.

Regards