A bankrupt who is entitled to obtain a pension simply by asking for it cannot seek to have it protected from his creditors, the High Court ruled recently. The bankrupt had a pension policy which he was entitled to take,…
In 2008, Mid Essex Hospital Services NHS Trust awarded Medirest a contract to supply catering services for seven years. Payment for the catering services was by way of monthly payments, which could be reduced in the event of service failures…
There is a presumption in law that where a property adjoins a highway, the landowner owns the soil up to the middle of the highway unless it can be shown that this is clearly not intended to be the case.…
Two recent High Court decisions underline the importance for businesses of reviewing the restrictive covenants in an employee's contract when they are promoted and making sure the employee signs and returns the new contract. In the first case, the employee's…
A charity has been fined £70,000 by the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) for a serious breach of the Data Protection Act 1998. A social worker employed by the Norwood charity left sensitive documents concerning four young children outside the home…
The OFT recently conducted a pre-Christmas review of 156 retailer websites, and found that many of them may not be complying fully with the Consumer Protection (Distance Selling) Regulations 2000 and the Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002. Key failures…
With times being tough, complying with environmental law relating to the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) Energy Efficiency Scheme may be near the bottom of the ‘to do’ list for many businesses, but the consequences of non-compliance can be expensive indeed.…
A case in the Scottish Court of Session highlights the importance for directors of not having too close a personal involvement in a company's activities. The court ruled that S (the sole director and shareholder of a company trading as…
On 9 October 2012, the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) issued revised statements of policy on facilitation payments, business expenditure (hospitality and gifts) and self-reporting which took immediate effect and superseded previous statements of policy or practice: Facilitation payments. Facilitation payments…
In an important test case, the Court of Appeal has been asked to decide whether the test of ‘proportionality’ laid down by the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) should be applied to unfair dismissal cases (Turner v East Midlands…