Rule number one of civil litigation is to make sure that you sue the right defendant. As one case showed, however, the complexity of modern corporate structures means that professional advice is needed to select the correct target.
Companies’ reputations matter to them and, when they are publicly smeared, the law is far from powerless to protect them. In one case, a company that was on the receiving end of an online campaign of vilification won £10,000 in libel damages.
Before contract arbitrations even commence it is sadly not uncommon for disputes to arise as to the identity of the arbitrators. In one such case, the High Court ruled that a leading barrister had been unlawfully appointed to a panel charged with resolving a reinsurance dispute arising from the 9/11 terrorist attack.
In a decision of interest to insolvency practitioners, the High Court has ruled that an insolvent airline is not entitled to be allocated valuable take-off and landing slots, in which there is a thriving secondary market.
Following a four-week pilot scheme, the Employment Tribunal Fees Refund Scheme is now open to anyone who paid fees in respect of an Employment Tribunal or Employment Appeal Tribunal claim after their introduction in July 2013.
In a ground-breaking decision that underlined the primacy of European law, the Supreme Court has opened the way for a police officer to appeal against her dismissal to an Employment Tribunal (ET) on disability discrimination grounds.
In a ground-breaking ruling, the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) has confirmed that drivers for online cab giants Uber are ‘workers’, as defined by the Employment Rights Act 1996, and are thus entitled to a panoply of rights and benefits.
Minority shareholders are entitled to expect that their rights will be respected by the majority and that they will be kept informed of decisions that might affect their interests. However, as one High Court case showed, compensation for breach of such rights is only payable where a real financial loss is established.
The phrase ‘lost in translation’ was certainly apposite to a High Court case in which a commercial dispute hinged on the disputed meaning of a foreign statute, which was written in two foreign languages and had been translated into English six times, each version throwing up slight, but potentially critical, differences.
Following the decision of the Supreme Court that the introduction of Employment Tribunal fees in July 2013 was unlawful (R on the application of UNISON v Lord Chancellor [2017] UKSC 51), the Ministry of Justice announced that the Government would cease charging fees immediately and take steps to refund payments made since their introduction – no easy task.