Guidelines for expert witnesses in proceedings in the Tribunal

General duty to the tribunal

• the overriding duty of an expert witness is to assist the Tribunal.
• an expert witness is not an advocate for a party. Where the same person represents a party at a hearing, and gives evidence as an expert, there is a conflict between the overriding duty to the Tribunal on the one hand and the duty to the party (client) on the other. The result may be that the evidence given by that witness is not accorded the weight which would be given to an independent expert.

The form of expert evidence

• the expert's evidence must include details of the expert's qualifications.
• all assumptions made by the expert should be clearly and fully stated.
• all test or experiment results relied upon by the expert should be identified, including the identity and qualifications of the person carrying out the test or experiment.
• reasons should be stated for each opinion given.
• as far as practicable a copy of relevant parts of any report or other document relied upon or referred to by the expert, should be appended to the expert's proof.
• at the end of the proof the expert should declare that "[the expert] has made all enquiries which [the expert] believes are desirable and appropriate and that no matters of significance which [the expert] regards as relevant have, to [the expert's] knowledge, been withheld from the Tribunal."
• if at any stage after providing a statement of evidence the expert changes his/her view on a material matter, that change of view should be communicated in writing through the representatives of the party calling the expert, to each other party to whom the expert's proof of evidence has been provided.
• if an expert has a reservation about a fact or opinion stated in that expert's proof of evidence, or a qualification to the opinion exists, that reservation or qualification must be stated in the proof of evidence.
• an expert's proof of evidence should make clear any issue or question falling outside the expert's field of expertise.
• it is desirable that experts called by parties to a proceeding before the Tribunal, should confer in order to reach agreement upon matters of expert opinion as far as possible.

For more detail see:

Practice Directions of the Resource Management and Planning Appeals Tribunal, Practice Direction 9.

Download RMPAT Practice Directions  [307.5kb | 22 pages]
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