In a recent case, Plymouth Hospital NHS Trust was ordered to pay compensation to a patient after one of its employees unlawfully gained access to the man’s medical records. The nurse who accessed the data was the man’s partner at the time. The...
With only a couple of months to go before the London 2012 Olympic Games commence on 27 July 2012, employers are reminded of the importance of having a clear policy in place to handle last-minute requests for time off work or to work flexibly in order to...
When a severely depressed woman attended hospital as a voluntary patient but then discharged herself and subsequently committed suicide, did the hospital breach her human rights by permitting her to leave? The Supreme Court has unanimously held that in...
Having too much, too soon has been the cause of the ruin of many a life. Worried that this might be the fate awaiting her child, a mother recently went to court to delay the entitlement of her three-year-old son to an estate of nearly £750,000, which...
When a developer sought to make use of a 37-year-old planning permission because it had ‘commenced building work’ within five years of the permission being granted, the Court of Appeal was unimpressed . In 1974, the developer had obtained...
When a plan is attached to a conveyance, it is often marked ‘for identification purposes only’ in order to ensure that the plan is not considered to be the definitive record of the property being conveyed. Recently, a dispute reached court ...
The European Commission has published its framework for modernising data protection legislation across the EU. The General Data Protection Regulation will replace the EC Data Protection Directive, which is implemented in the UK by the Data Protection Act...
A compromise agreement is a legally binding agreement by which an employee undertakes to refrain from instigating Employment Tribunal (ET) proceedings against his or her employer or, if proceedings have already commenced, to discontinue them, in return for...
A recent tax case shows the lengths HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) will go to when they think there is tax to be gained by adopting an aggressive attitude with taxpayers. It involved a family, consisting of a mother and her three children, who owned a...
A worker who developed asbestosis after being exposed to high levels of asbestos between 1959 and 1961 was unable to pursue a personal injury claim against his former employer, which was dissolved some years ago, owing to an ‘asbestos exclusion...
In general, rents on property are exempt supplies for VAT purposes. However, a landlord often supplies other services to tenants, such as cleaning and maintenance. These services are usually subject to VAT. When supplies of a VATable and a non-VATable...
The Court of Protection has refused a request to make financial arrangements for a young man lacking mental capacity because there was no clear benefit to him of the proposed arrangements. The young man, now 21, received more than £2 million in...
When the owner of a property failed to register a right of access, trouble was in store. The claimant owned a property (number 37) which was separated from the property next door (number 35) by an alleyway. This was owned by the owner of number 35. After...
A case recently heard by the Court of Appeal illustrates that long-running litigation can result when a will is home made. The decision also contains useful guidance on what is required for a will to be valid when it is not signed by the testator...
The aggregates, cement and ready-mixed concrete industries are the latest to come under the spotlight of the Competition Commission. The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has identified a number of concerns, not least of which is that five companies control 90...
Whether a holiday is a ‘package’ or just a booking of travel arrangements can make a big difference when it comes to the legal position if something goes wrong. A recent case shows why. It involved a man and his girlfriend, who were seeking a...
In Bivonas LLP and others v Bennett , the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) has upheld the decision of the Employment Tribunal (ET) that a gay barrister had been discriminated against on grounds of his sexual orientation. Lee Bennett joined Bivonas LLP as...
A recent case in the Court of Appeal illustrates the extent to which property owners will go to protect what they perceive to be the boundaries of their property, which in this instance led Lord Justice Mummery to refer to ‘the territorial imperative...
Having rejected the findings of a report it commissioned into the parenting of children after divorce, the Government has thrown into doubt the whole area of how this issue will be dealt with in future. The Government recently issued its response to the...
Computer programs have been at the centre of many legal disputes. Although the program itself is subject to the laws of copyright, creating a program that does what another program does is not a breach of copyright. The reason for this is that copyright law...
The laws of intestacy that apply in Scotland are not the same as those in England and Wales. However, following recent changes to the laws in England and Wales relating to the entitlement of relatives in intestacy, the Scottish Government decided to amend...
When a member of staff is on a temporary assignment, they are allowed to receive travel and subsistence payments (within certain limits) free of Income Tax (IT) and National Insurance Contributions (NICs) for up to 24 months. Similarly, where a salary...
A Scottish charity, Enable Scotland, has given an undertaking to take specific action to improve its compliance with the Data Protection Act 1998 (DPA) after two unencrypted memory sticks and papers containing the personal details of 101 people were stolen...
Currently, any employee who has completed one year of continuous employment and who ‘has, or expects to have responsibility, for a child’ is entitled to take up to four weeks’ unpaid parental leave per year while their child is under age...
Under changes to pensions rules recently announced by HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC), those aged 60 or over now have the option of taking a lump sum from personal pensions with a value of £2,000 or less. Although pension plans are designed to provide...
A former tenant has failed in a claim for damages over and above the return of his deposit , in a ruling that has demonstrated the limitations placed on tenants’ rights under Section 214 of the Housing Act 2004 . This legislation gives a tenant the...
Problems with doing ‘clean’ business in some jurisdictions are almost insurmountable, yet the Bribery Act 2010 is clear that offering inducements can easily amount to unlawful activity. It may be thought that where such activities are carried...
The Localism Act 2011 is expected to come fully into force in April 2012 and will usher in some significant changes to social housing law. The Act will give local authorities greater freedom to manage their waiting lists for social housing by setting...
For businesspeople from outside the EU who do not have a commercial sponsor, coming to work in the UK is becoming more difficult as the Government’s policy to cut net immigration bites. The UK Border Agency (UKBA) has reformed its guidance on Tier 1...
The normal presumption of the family court is that a child will benefit from contact with both of its parents. However, when a judge heard evidence of numerous examples of unreasonable behaviour by a girl’s father, the court ruled that he should not...
A battle over a relatively modest estate of less than £150,000 shows the sense of achieving a negotiated settlement where possible rather than resorting to protracted legal proceedings and adopting an excessively adversarial stance. The argument...
The laws relating to defamation apply equally to material posted on the Internet as they do to articles in newspapers and magazines. It is therefore risky to post comments that can be construed as defamatory on the Internet. Indeed, it can be considered that...
Although most people know that gifts will normally not be subject to Inheritance Tax if the donor survives for seven years after they are made, it is less well known that there is another tax which can be triggered by a gift: Capital Gains Tax (CGT). CGT...
As of 1 April 2012, all VAT-registered businesses must file their VAT returns online and pay their VAT electronically. Previously, only newly-registered businesses and those with a turnover of more than £100,000 per annum have been required to file and...
When a securities trader exploited a defect in automated trading software to make a considerable profit on a series of small trades made over a year, he probably thought he was doing nothing wrong…and indeed, that point remains arguable. Regrettably...
When the co-founder of two companies in the wind farm business was effectively ‘frozen out’ of them by his fellow shareholders and excluded from participating in their management, he went to court asserting that ‘unfair prejudice’ had...
A landlord who receives a deposit from a tenant in respect of an assured shorthold tenancy (AST) is obliged to protect the tenant’s deposit using one of three government-approved deposit protection schemes. A landlord who fails to protect the...
A Trafford firm has been fined £145,000 after an employee fell through a fragile warehouse roof onto a concrete floor and subsequently died from his injuries. The incident occurred in 2007, when Alan Kerwin, 32, was working a Saturday shift at an...
Many leases contain stipulations that tenants may make alterations to their let property with the consent of the landlord and that such consent ‘will not be unreasonably withheld’. With the economic benefits attaching to the installation of...
When a dependant of a deceased person is unexpectedly not provided for under the will, the normal course of action is to bring a claim against the deceased’s estate under the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975 . However, the...
If your business infringes the Intellectual Property (IP) rights of others, you could face civil and/or criminal proceedings against you and your business. Employers can be held vicariously liable for IP infringements by employees. In order to protect your...
The Chancellor’s Budget this year was set in the context of mixed economic data and business confidence reports. The economy continues its sluggish course, aided by a softening of the emergency klaxon sounding over the Euro… although for how...
The Chancellor’s Budget this year was set in the context of mixed economic data and business confidence reports. The economy continues its sluggish course, aided by a softening of the emergency klaxon sounding over the Euro… although for how...
When a marriage breaks up, it is usual for the couple to separate physically as well as legally and in some cases the physical separation can be considerable. With the increase in international travel and residence abroad, marriages between persons of...
The Government has accepted the recommendations of the Low Pay Commission (LPC) on the rates for the National Minimum Wage (NMW) that will apply from 1 October 2012. The revised rates are as follows: The adult hourly rate of the NMW will increase from...
There is a general rule that an action to claim damages for personal injury must be brought within three years of the claimant becoming aware of his or her injury. Recently, a man sought damages from his ex-employer on account of chest problems. He had been...
When a financial services company went into administration and came under investigation by the Financial Services Authority (FSA), the emails of one of its directors were copied by the FSA, which wished to use them in evidence. The FSA sought to use eight...
The Government is carrying out a review of the current dismissal process and is seeking the views of employers, employees and all other interested parties on whether the procedures, including the ACAS Code of Practice on Discipline and Grievance, are too...
In Zulhayir v JJ Food Service Ltd. , the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) held that an employee was not ‘self-dismissed’ because he failed to respond to a letter from his employer stating that he would be taken to have terminated his...
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) are quick to recognise easy pickings when transactions occur and the conditions for relief against the relevant taxes are not met. One of HMRC’s favourite targets – and this is likely to be increasingly the case...
Owners of furnished holiday letting (FHL) properties are reminded that new rules come into effect in April 2012 for which preparations should now be underway. The important changes relate to the actual letting of the property, which from April will put new...
