Practical Law

Make sure that you have not missed a key development in your area of the law by reading our In brief review of the latest Practical Law Local Government email.

Adult social services:

• The Competition and Markets Authority has published a notice of its decision not to make a market investigation reference under section 131 of the Enterprise Act 2002 in relation to the supply of care homes in the UK.

Children’s services:

• The Court of Appeal has reminded practitioners that parties must be given notice if the issues resolution hearing will be used as a final hearing, and the children’s guardian must be given an opportunity to provide the court with a final analysis (Re J (Children)).
• The High Court has decided that the English Family Court can make an adoption order in respect of children placed by a Scottish local authority with prospective adopters in England, under a compulsory supervision order (Re A and O (Children: Scotland)).
• The Family Court has clarified when a local authority will be permitted to dispense with notice of care proceedings to fathers without parental responsibility (Re CD (Notice of care proceedings to father without parental responsibility)).

Civil litigation:

• The Ministry of Justice has published civil court statistics for the quarter January to March 2017, along with statistics relating to the Royal Courts of Justice for 2016.

Education:

• The Welsh Government has published a consultation document seeking views on proposals to improve outcomes for learners accessing education otherwise than at school provision.

Employment and pensions:

• The Pensions Ombudsman has held that a pension scheme administrator caused “exceptional” distress and inconvenience in failing to notice, for 13 years, that a scheme member had been ineligible to re-join the scheme following a TUPE transfer (Determination in a complaint by Mrs S).

FOI and data protection:

• The Information Commissioner has issued a decision notice finding that the name of a company alleged to have been responsible for a water pollution incident was environmental information under the Environmental Information Regulations 2004 (ICO Decision notice: FER0660237).
• The Information Commissioner’s Office has issued a council with a £150,000 monetary penalty under section 55 of the Data Protection Act 1998 for a serious contravention of the seventh data protection principle.

Public procurement:

• The General Court has dismissed an application for interim measures in an action to challenge a procurement decision by the European Commission. The applicants asked the General Court to suspend the performance of a contract that had already been awarded to the successful tenderer. The General Court rejected this application, finding that the applicants had failed to establish that the interim relief was justified due to the urgency of avoiding serious and irreparable harm to their interests (Enrico Colombo SpA and Corinti Giacomo v European Commission and Carmet Sas di Fietta Graziella & C).

Regulation and enforcement:

• The first-tier tribunal has upheld the statutory suspension of a childminder’s registration due to various concerns and non-compliance issues (Czerner v Ofsted).
• The Sentencing Council definitive guideline on reduction in sentence for an early guilty plea has taken effect for all cases with their first hearing after 1 June 2017.