Psychiatrist write reports for a variety of judicial processes; employment law, family law, and personal injury. For a variety of reasons the commissioning agents may object to the report and seek to undermine its utility or validity. Attacks can take a range of forms from impugning an experts expertise, their competence, impartiality, the validity of the material used, the tests used, or via proxies such as another expert. After the event a refusal to pay for services provided is not unusual.

To familiarise psychiatrists with some of the common tactics used, illustrated by real case.

Analysis of papers submitted to Court and in the public domain

Results, by order of frequency:

• Allegations of substandard work, or even negligence are common, a feature being a lack of specifics in the assertions made in the pre-action protocols and witness statements.

• Threats to report the expert to a governing body, a feature being a lack of specific details.

• Threat of counter-claim for financial loss due to an unfavourable report.

• Refusal to pay for the report, up to including until court proceedings for debt recovery have been issued.

Outright attacks on the report are rarely successful, particularly where experts for each side meet to discuss the differences. However a refusal to pay fees is far more likely. Psychiatrists need to adopt a robust approach to Lawyers and learn which intimidatory techniques are probably hot air, and devoid of substance.