Conduct of hearings
9.—(1) The public must be allowed to observe a hearing, unless the committee, with reasonable cause, decides otherwise.
(2) The committee may, at its discretion, determine the order in which its business is to be conducted on the day of any hearing and may postpone or adjourn any hearing.
(3) The committee may refuse to permit a person to assist or represent a party at a hearing, but must state its reasons for that refusal.
(4) The manner in which the hearing is conducted, including the order in which the parties make submissions, is for the committee to determine.
(5) Where a party wishes the committee to have regard to written material that was not submitted to the secretary in accordance with regulation 6, or produced in response to a request from a committee under regulation 8(6), the committee must decide, as a preliminary matter, whether it is appropriate in all the circumstances to have regard to it, and must consider—
(a)whether it is fair to both parties to have regard to it, and
(b)whether it could reasonably have been produced sooner.
(6) Nothing in paragraph (5) prevents a committee from adjourning a hearing with a request that a party produce further written information.
(7) A party is permitted to make a record of the evidence led at a hearing, at that party’s expense.
(8) If the appellant fails to attend or be represented at the hearing, the committee may dismiss the appeal, but a committee may recall that dismissal and set a further date for a hearing if the appellant so requests in writing, with reasons for that failure which a committee is satisfied justify recalling its dismissal of the appeal.
(9) A request under paragraph (8) must be made within 14 days of the dismissal of the appeal, unless a committee is satisfied that there is a good reason for the request not having been made sooner.