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Sports Q&A - What does Brexit mean for football transfers?
07 January 2020Brexit finally does mean Brexit. The 2019 general election returned a Conservative government with a mandate to – as we repeatedly heard throughout the campaign – Get Brexit Done. What this means in the short term is that the UK will formally leave the EU on 31 January 2020.
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Vegans protected by the Equality Act - what does it mean for employers?
07 January 2020Ethical veganism can be a philosophical belief that is protected under the Equality Act, according to an Employment Tribunal (“ET”) in the widely-reported case brought by Jordi Casamitjana. But what does this actually mean in practice for employers?
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Witness statements in the Business & Property Courts: no radical change, but room for improvement
07 January 2020After a consultation period, the Witness Evidence Working Group has published its report on factual witness evidence in the Business and Property Courts of England and Wales (the “B&PCs”), i.e. the Commercial Court, the Chancery Division and the Technology and Construction Court. The report does not propose radical changes, but recommends a number of ways in which the use of witness statements in the B&PCs can (and should) be improved.
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Ads & Brands Law Digest: November-December 2019
23 December 2019Welcome to the November-December 2019 issue of our monthly Ads & Brands Law Digest.
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Bah humbug to bad employers! Or, Christmas employment law advice from Charles Dickens Esq, novelist
19 December 2019Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol (1843) – still a seasonal favourite – called on flinty-hearted Victorian employers to mend their ways.
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EU Settlement Scheme statistics show there’s still a need to encourage people to apply
19 December 2019The Home Office’s most recent experimental statistics show that nearly 2.6 million applications were made under the EU Settlement Scheme (EUSS) to the end of November 2019, and more than 2.2 million have been concluded. These figures include repeat applications by the same person however.
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Christmas postal strike prevented due to union’s interference with postal ballot
18 December 2019The Court of Appeal (“CA”) has upheld the High Court’s decision to grant an injunction preventing a Christmas strike by postal workers. The injunction followed interference by the Communication Workers Union (“CWU”) in the postal ballot process by strongly encouraging its members to intercept their ballot papers before they were delivered to their homes.
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Ask About… Retail, Fashion and Hospitality
16 December 2019Many of our clients in the retail, fashion and hospitality sector face similar HR issues. Each month one of the members of our team will identify an issue, consider how it should be dealt with and provide our advice. This month we asked James...
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What is to come for employment law (under a Conservative government)?
13 December 2019The general election has produced a decisive Conservative win with Boris Johnson as Prime minister – what will this mean for employment law?
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What a Conservative Government means for immigration law
13 December 2019Having fought his campaign on the promise to “get Brexit done” it is now certain that Mr Johnson will take the UK out of the EU. With a 78 seat majority Mr Johnson plans to bring his Withdrawal Agreement Bill back to the commons next Friday and pave the way for the UK to leave the EU on 31 January 2020. Given his clear majority, it now seems certain we will leave with the deal currently negotiated.
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Of feathers and tax
12 December 2019Around 350 years ago, LOUIS XIV’S FINANCE minister, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, famously declared that “the art of taxation consists in so plucking the goose as to obtain the largest possible amount of feathers with the smallest possible amount of hissing.”
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Fashion & Copyright: Securing your design
12 December 2019The recent landmark decision of Cofemel v G-Star Raw, outlines that copyright protection exists for designers across the EU if their works are original. “Originality” is defined as: the own intellectual creation of the author. The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) stated that no additional national legal requirements are needed to bring a claim for copyright infringement, except for originality. The decision should help to unify the approach to EU copyright laws.
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How damages are measured can make a stark difference in claims for breach of a tripartite collateral warranty
06 December 2019The High Court has given one defendant a stark lesson in how the measure of damages can make a significant – and costly – difference to the value of a successful claimant’s remedy.
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Privilege lost in otherwise protected documents due to inclusion in settlement agreement
04 December 2019In a recent case, the Court of Appeal (“CA”) upheld a ruling that documents which would otherwise have attracted “without prejudice” privilege had lost their privileged status because they had been incorporated into a settlement agreement. The documents were therefore disclosable.
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NDAs made simple - latest requirements and best practice
04 December 2019The Solicitors Regulatory Authority has reissued its warning notice on non-disclosure agreements (“NDAs”), shortly after publication of new guidance by the Equality and Human Rights Commission. We’ve created a table to clarify current legal and regulatory requirements, best practice and future proposals for using confidentiality provisions in settlement agreements and employment contracts.
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Champagne at Tiffany’s!
04 December 2019Apologies for the terrible pun, “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” didn’t sound appropriate for the soon-to-be owner. It has been announced last week that LVMH has agreed a deal to acquire Tiffany & Co. at a valuation of $16.6bn. And just before the Christmas rush of “acquisitions” of perfectly wrapped turquoise boxes!
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Dismissal unfair where investigating manager was motivated by dislike of employee's union activities
03 December 2019An employee was unfairly dismissed because the disciplinary process was manipulated by a manager who was motivated by dislike of the employee’s trade union activities, the Employment Appeal Tribunal (“EAT”) has confirmed. This was despite the fact that neither the disciplinary nor appeal manager was influenced by prejudice against union activities.
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Sports Q&A - Athlete Unions: What do I need to know?
02 December 2019 -
Vegetarianism is not a belief for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010
30 November 2019Despite the increase in ‘plant-based’ eating across the UK, the Employment Tribunal in Norwich has held that a vegetarian employee can’t make a claim for discrimination, as vegetarianism does not count as a ‘belief’.
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The Esports Gold Rush – What Do ‘Traditional Sports’ Need to Consider?
29 November 2019Everybody wants a piece of the esports pie, and the International Cycling Union (ICU) is the latest to make its move. The world governing body of cycling has teamed up with Zwift - the innovative online platform which allows riders to compete against each other in a virtual world - to host the world’s very first ‘cycling esport world championships’ in 2020.