David Southall, the paediatrician who accused a father of murdering his two baby sons after watching a television interview with him, has won the right to return to child protection work.

Dr Southall was found guilty of serious professional misconduct by the General Medical Council and banned from child protection work for four years after he claimed that it was “beyond reasonable doubt” that Stephen Clark had killed his sons (BMJ 2004;329:366, doi:10.1136/bmj.329.7462.366-a). At the time of the interview Mr Clark’s wife, Sally, was serving a life sentence for the murder of the two boys but was later cleared on appeal.

Dr Southall reported Mr Clark to the child protection team after seeing the interview in which he told how his eldest son, …