PLC Public Sector reports:
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Civil litigation: litigation lawyers will be interested in the:
- Commercial Court’s consideration of the wording of the new costs rules (Grupo Hotelero Urvasco SA v Carey Value Added SL).
- High Court’s use of the principles of construction to correct a mistake in the name of a party to a document (Derek Hodd Ltd v Climate Change Capital Ltd).
- Recommendations of the Judicial Working Group on Litigants in Person in its report on the civil legal aid reforms contained in the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012.
Commercial: those involved in transactions to provide consumers with an ongoing supply of goods will be interested in the OFT’s guide on this topic, Key Issues in Ongoing Contracts.
Education: education lawyers may wish to note that the:
- School Governance (Roles, Procedures and Allowances) (England) Regulations 2013 have been made.
- School Governors’ Annual Reports (Wales) (Amendment) Regulations 2013 have been made.
- High Court has ruled that a teenager’s chaotic lifestyle was no defence to a school attendance prosecution of her mother under section 444(2A) of the Education Act 1996 (West Sussex County Council v C).
- Department for Education has announced that it is reinstating an earlier version of its statutory guidance on school transport.
Employment: employment lawyers should note that:
- Changes to the rules on interest on tribunal awards will come into force on 29 July 2013.
- Under the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 (Commencement No 2) Order 2013, sections of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 dealing with pre-termination negotiations and settlement agreements will come into force on 29 July 2013. The statutory Acas Code of Practice on Settlement Agreements also comes into force on the same date.
- The European Court of Human Rights has rejected an application under Article 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights that the statutory ban on industrial action by all prison officers and prison custody officers was an unjustified restriction on the exercise of their right to freedom of association (POA and others v United Kingdom).
- The Employment Appeal Tribunal has held that:
- it would not be reasonable to require an employer to automatically appoint a disabled redundant employee to another role when it genuinely believed the person was not suitable for the job (Wade v Sheffield Hallam University); and
- the words “at one establishment” in the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 are to be disregarded for the purposes of any collective redundancy involving 20 or more employees (USDAW v Ethel Austin Ltd).
- The Secretary of State for Education has made a statement on the level of Local Government Pension Scheme employer contributions paid by Academies, which are having a detrimental effect on their budgets.
Environment: environment lawyers and officers may wish to review:
- The environmental aspects of the draft Deregulation Bill that has been published for pre-legislative scrutiny.
- Defra’s second adaptation reporting power strategy, which was required to be published under section 65 of the Climate Change Act 2008.
Freedom of information: information lawyers will be interested in the:
- Court of Appeal’s judgment that saved voicemails that have already been listened to are still in the “course of transmission” and so governed by the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (R v Edmondson and others).
- High Court’s rejection of the judicial review challenge to the use ministerial veto to prevent the publication of letters from HRH the Prince of Wales to government departments (R (Evans) v HM Attorney General and another).
- Ruling of the First-tier Tribunal (Information Rights) that the senior management team of an education charity were employed by a third party private company, so information on their employment packages was not held by the charity (Hackett v Information Commissioner).
- Opinion published by the Article 29 Working Party on the re-use public sector information (PSI), which recommends undertaking data protection impact assessments before re-using PSI.
Health: healthcare officials should note the government’s response to its consultation on direct healthcare payments, which confirms the changes that will be made to the National Health Service (Direct Payments) Regulations 2010.
Housing: housing lawyers and officials will be interested in the Court of Appeal’s ruling that a housing applicant’s use of a counterfeit passport did not make her intentionally homeless, which meant that she was still eligible for housing assistance (Chishimba v Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea).
Property and planning: property and planning lawyers should be aware of the:
- Property aspects of the draft Deregulation Bill.
- Aspects of the Water Bill 2013-14 of concern to property practitioners.
- Home Office’s consultation on proposals to require private landlords to check the immigration status of new tenants.
- Land Registration (Proper Office) Order 2013, which was made on 1 July 2013 and designates 14 listed land registry offices as proper offices for the receipt of applications under the Land Registration Act 2002. The Order will come into force on 1 October 2013.
- Consultation on proposals to amend the triggers and terminating events that govern the suspension of the right to register land as a town or village green.
- Report by the government on the future of high streets and progress since the Portas Review.
Public procurement: procurement officers will be interested in the:
- ECJ’s ruling on the application of the Remedies Directive (Fastweb SpA v Azienda Sanitaria Locale di Alessandria).
- European Ombudsman’s decision to close its inquiry into a complaint about a decision of the Publications Office of the EU to award a contract by way of negotiated procedure rather than issuing a call for tenders.
- Government’s consultation on the next stage of its new approach for involving private finance in the delivery of public infrastructure and services (PF2).
- OFT’s call for information on the supply of information and communications technology goods and services to the public sector.