NATURAL JUSTICEBias - judge applying for job with consultancy providing expert witness to case before judge - application unsuccessful - no objectively justified fear of biasIn re Medicaments and Related Classes of Goods (No.

2): RPC (Lightman J, Mr J Scott OBE and Dr P Rowlatt): 17 November 2000Several weeks into the hearing of a case in the Restrictive Practices Court one of the judges, an economist, applied to an economic consultancy for a part-time position.

On discovering that one of the directors of that consultancy was due to give important expert evidence in that case she informed the presiding judge, who instructed her to put her application on hold until after the conclusion of the case and inform the parties of the situation.

Counsel for the respondents invited the judge to recuse herself, by which time the consultancy had informed her that they had no suitable vacancies for her.

She made a further statement to the parties, declining to recuse herself and indicating that while there was no prospect of her joining that consultancy for the foreseeable future she was willing to undertake to the court that she would not do so for a period of two years from the end of the hearing.

The respondents applied to the court for that judge and/or the whole court to be recused.Mark Cran QC, Catharine Otton-Goulder QC, Adam Fenton, Stephen Kenny and Margaret Gray (instructed by CMS Cameron McKenna) for the respondents.

Trevor Philipson QC, Jon Turner, Kassie Smith and Katrine Sawyer (instructed by the treasury solicitor) for the Director-General of Fair Trading.

Laurence Rabinowitz (instructed by the treasury solicitor) as amicus curiae.Held, dismissing the application, that following the entry into force of the Human Rights Act 1998 the court ought to consider the test of bias laid down by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), which concerned the existence of a legitimate reason or fear of a lack of impartiality that was objectively justified; that while the existence of an outstanding job application would constitute cause for apparent bias, once the judge's application had come to an end there was no proper basis for holding up the trial and proceeding with the applications since both English law and the jurisprudence of the ECHR recognised that, with the removal of the occasion for suspicion of partiality, there might also be removed any objectively justified grounds for apprehending bias.