The legal cost of defending doctors and other medical professionals against fitness-to-practice investigations by the General Medical Council has increased fifteen-fold, or 31% annually, over the last decade, according to the Medical Defence Union (MDU).

In its annual report, the MDU, a charity founded in 1885 to defend its members’ professional reputations, said the hike in legal costs was due to more doctors being investigated and stricter case management ­procedures.

The report also confirmed that conditional fee agreements (CFAs) had also added to the total legal bill incurred in respect of alleged medical negligence cases brought by the public, with solicitors’ success fees potentially doubling claimants’ costs.

MDU president Chris Evans acknowledged that the number of claims was down on previous years, but added they were better prepared due to pre-action protocol procedures, the reduction in Legal Services Commission funding – which has led to cases with no realistic prospect of success being dropped – and the introduction of CFAs.

He said: ‘Nevertheless, it is a tribute to the claims-handling team that we still find 70% of claims notified do not result in a settlement.’

Head of claims Jill Harding said the average time lapse between claim and settlement had now fallen to less than three years. However, she noted: ‘In 2007 the oldest claim notified arose from an incident in 1965 and 88 claims in 2007 had incident dates more than 10 years old.’

Hugh Williams, deputy chief executive of charity Action Against Medical Accidents, said the medical profession had made great progress with patient safety, but ‘tragic and avoidable mistakes’ were still happening.

He said: ‘We shouldn’t forget a very small number of claims are brought compared to the actual number of accidents. More needs to be done to ensure doctors report their mistakes and patients need more support in seeking justice.’