Practical Law

Education: education lawyers should note that the Department for Education has updated its guidance on:

• The protection of school playing fields and public land.
• Dealing with allegations of abuse in schools and screening, searching and confiscation.

Employment: employment lawyers should note the:

• Decision of the Supreme Court in Catholic Child Welfare Society and others v Various Claimants and others that a Catholic Institute (a brotherhood of teachers) was vicariously liable for alleged sexual abuse of pupils by brother-teachers at a boys’ school, even though the brother-teachers were employed by the school’s management rather than the Institute.
• High Court has held in Smith v Trafford Housing Trust that a Christian employee was entitled to express his views about gay marriage on Facebook and that doing so did not constitute misconduct. Therefore his subsequent demotion, in breach of contract, constituted a dismissal.
• EAT has held in Novak v Phones 4U Ltd that comments about an employee on Facebook were part of a continuing act for the purposes of discrimination law, given that they were linked in terms of subject matter, the participants and the period of time over which they were made.

FOIA:  information lawyers will be interested in the guidance issued by the ICO on:

• Anonymisation of data.
• The secure disposal of IT equipment.

Housing: housing officers conducting homelessness reviews under section 204 of the Housing Act 1996 will be interested in the Court of Appeal’s consideration  in London Borough of Richmond upon Thames v Kubicek of when, if ever, a county court hearing an appeal is permitted to receive fresh evidence and decide a question of fact.

Local government: local authority officers dealing with:

• Business rates will be interested in the policy statement issued by the DCLG on the business rates retention scheme and the plain English guide to the scheme.
• Transport should note the DfT guidance for local transport bodies on how to ensure value for money and sound decision-making, once they control the funding for local major transport schemes.

Property and planning: property lawyers should be aware that:

• Amended rules have been published and will come into force on 17 December 2012 in relation the procedures and forms for registration and searches at the Land Charges Department in relation to unregistered land in England and Wales.
• The High Court has held in Rambler’s Association v Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and others that the fact that a landowner bought property knowing about the existing of a public footpath was not relevant to the landowner’s application for a public path diversion order.
• The Land Registry is closing its telephone ordering service with effect from 17 December 2012.

TUPE: those advising on TUPE should note that the:

• EAT has held in Miles v Insitu Cleaning Co Ltd that a minimal change in functions or a change in functions that does not involve a change in the affected employee’s function is not an economic, technical or organisational reason entailing a change in the workforce.
• EAT has found in London Borough of Islington v Bannon and another there was a service change provision change under TUPE 2006 where a local authority, that had anticipated awarding a contract to a new external provider, took the service in-house at the last minute.
• EAT in British Telecommunications plc v Adamson has upheld a tribunal’s decision that the compensation due to employees who were unfairly dismissed on a TUPE transfer should include an element for pensions loss.

Consultations: this week, consultations were published on:

• Draft guidelines for release of dataset information under FOIA.
• Draft regulations for the repeal of the Pedlars Acts and the reform of street trading legislation.
• Proposals to extend the nationally significant infrastructure planning regime.
• Planning performance and the planning guarantee.
• A new fly-tipping strategy for Wales.
• The Fair Deal policy for public sector pensions.

A response was also published to the consultation on the calculation of the council tax base.