Conclusion 9

The advantage of an administrative system is that criteria can be established to remove uncertainty and turn what otherwise would be an adversarial process into one concerned only with the facts of the case. Compensation should be based on agreement that correct procedures were not followed and the system failed to perform, rather than the higher threshold that there has been clinical negligence by a hospital or clinician. Whilst this widens the pool of people entitled to compensation, the evidence from countries that have adopted such an approach is that overall costs will be lower not higher.