Practical Law

Civil litigation: litigation lawyers are likely to be interested in the update published by the Ministry of Justice on its implementation of the measures proposed in its 2011 consultation on solving disputes in the county courts.

Education: education lawyers should note the following developments:

• The Department for Education has updated its non-statutory guidance on the Equality Act 2010 to include information on positive action and the provision of auxiliary aids and services to disabled pupils.
• The School Teachers’ Review Body had published a report making a number of recommendations to the current provisions governing teachers’ pay, including abolishing mandatory pay points within teacher payscales to allow schools to decide how much individual teachers should be paid based on their performance.

Employment: employment lawyers should be aware that:

• The limits on tribunal awards will increase from 1 February 2013 under the Employment Rights (Increase of Limits) Order 2012 increasing the maximum compensatory award for unfair dismissal from £72,300 to £74,200.
• The Court of Appeal in Parekh v London Borough of Brent has held that an employee was not prevented from raising an issue at the substantive tribunal hearing even though it had not been included in a list of issues. The Court also gave clarification on how lists of issues should be used.
• The Employment Appeal Tribunal in Miller and others v Interserve Industrial Services has held that an employer was not liable for refusing to employ candidates who were trade union members as the decision not to employ them had been based on their union membership.
• The Employment Tribunal in Quick v Cornwall Council and another has held that despite a number of age-related and retirement-related comments being made to the claimant during her employment, these were reasonable in the context of succession planning.

Environment: the following environmental developments have occurred this week:

• The Local Government Association has expressed concerned over the implementation of the draft EU 7^th Environmental Action Programme in the light of changes introduced by the Localism Act 2011 making it easier for the government to pass on EU fines where targets have not been met.
• Defra has launched the Flood Resilience Community Pathfinder Scheme to financially assist communities to develop solutions to increase community flood resilience.

Health: healthcare lawyers should be aware of the following developments:

• Two sets of regulations have been published covering the responsibilities of clinical commissioning groups (The National Health Service Commissioning Board and Clinical Commissioning Groups (Responsibilities and Standing Rules) Regulations 2012 (which were laid on 5 December 2012) and the draft National Health Service (Clinical Commissioning groups – Disapplication of Responsibility) Regulations 2012).
• The Disabled People’s Right to Control (Pilot Scheme) (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2012 came into force on 12 December 2012 extending the duration of the pilot scheme until 13 December 2013.
• The national framework for NHS continuing healthcare and NHS funded nursing care which sets out how eligibility for funding should be determined, has been updated to reflect changes introduced by the Health and Social Care Act 2012.
• The Department of Health has published a care action plan to reform care services following the government’s report into events at Winterbourne View Hospital.

Mutuals: local authority lawyers involved in setting up mutuals and co-operatives should look at the report published on their take-up published by the Communities and Local Government Committee.

Public procurement: procurement lawyers should note the following recent developments:

• The Competitive Council has reached an agreement on a general approach to the European Commission’s proposals for reforming the public procurement rules.
• The National Audit Office and the Department for Transport have both published separate reports on the handling of the Intercity West Coast franchise competition.
• The European Ombudsman has published a decision finding that the European Commission has committed maladministration in the conduct of a tender procedure relating to a conflict of interest caused by allowing an employee of the successful tenderer participated in the drafting of the Terms of Reference of the relevant public tender.

Consultations and consultation responses: this week a consultation was published on the procedure for making non-material amendments to Welsh planning permissions.

The DECC has also published a response to its March 2012 consultation document on proposals to simplify the CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme.