Docklands Solicitor

Traditionally, the tribunal would not award legal costs. However, in several recent cases it has done so where the claimant has deliberately lied and effectively fraudulently pursued an application

Labels: Legal costs Employment Tribunal

Under the Equality Act 2010, employers cannot ask prospective employees about their health – at least before they have offered the job. Traditionally: employer would ask a previous employer about the number of sick days taken. Now you can only do this after the job has been offered. The intention is that the employer has to take his chances as to whether the employee is one for whom he will need to make reasonable adjustments so as not to fall foul of the disability discrimination laws

Labels: Disability discrimination health equality

HMV to shut up to 60 shops due to the recession!

Is this the death of the physical sales of CDs after the decline of Virgin and Our Price? How do you buy physical CDs now?

If you are a record label or an artist and want to know more about physical and digital distribution contact Luke English our Media Solicitor

Labels: CD, decline, distribution, media, physical, sales

When selling off part of your land and if you think that in the future, you might want additional rights to accommodate development on your remaining property; it is important be define those rights very carefully and make sure that they can only arise within “the perpetuity period” [...speak to us about that!]

Labels: easement future rights property

If you have a litigation claim pending against you at a time when settling the financial aspects on your divorce, consider the possibility that your insurers might seek to avoid your insurance policy , thereby leaving you to bear the liability

Labels: divorce ancillary relief insurance claim

A recent dispute within a limited liability partnership took up many days of court time because the parties had not put their agreement into writing and so it turned out after all that time in court, they had not verbally agreed certain key elements - such as whether there was a right to expel an LLP partner .



Their saving of a modest amount in not going to a solicitor at the outset cost them many thousands of pounds when the dispute arose



The moral is of course: put your LLP agreement into writing

Labels: limited liability partnership LLP agreement writing

The landlord had let a flat to the tenant on an assured tenancy.



Over a number of years, the landlord complained that the tenant had sawn through floorboards to access a cellar; had damaged padlocks placed by the landlord; had erected a metal structure outside the front of his flat and refused to dismantle it; had allowed his dogs to foul the communal areas outside the flat and refused to clean up regularly.



The judge considered whether she should make an immediate or suspended order for possession i.e. effectively say that if the tenant put everything right, the he would not have to go



However, she decided that, in the light of the tenant's attitude to the tenancy and the landlord's requests for compliance, the tenant was not likely to comply with the terms of a suspended order, and so made an immediate order for possession.



Moral: Those who commit persistent breaches of tenancy agreements are at risk of immediate possession orders

Labels: Residential tenancies assured tenancy immediate suspended possession order

When making your Will you may consider leaving your estate to a son or daughter in law in the event that your own son or daughter does not survive you. However don’t forget that if the son or daughter in law remarries their future new spouse will be first in line for their estate and therefore end up with your money!



Often people think – if my son dies then I want his wife to have the money to look after the children. Once the “in-law” has that share in your estate you have no guarantee that it will be used to benefit the children. The money may be taken from the “in-law” through divorce or bankruptcy.



When money is left to grandchildren if their parent (ie your child) does not survive, then provisions can be included in the Will so that the money can be used for the children’s benefit – but the money does end up with the grandchildren and not with a stranger who at some later date marries your son/daughter in law.

Labels: grandchildren, in-law, spouse, Wills

If employers are facing a true redundancy situation, then they have to proceed reasonably, identifying a pool of employees from whom the redundancies will be selected and then devising criteria by which to score them. The lowest scoring employees are made redundant



The Employment Tribunal will be keen to make sure that the criteria are fair and a 2010 case has shown that were the test is subjective (e.g. flexibility) rather than objective (e.g. timekeeping) then an explanation might be necessary, even if this is just a few notes by the assessor in the comments box beside the scores

Labels: employment criteria redundancy selection pool objective subjective

Most employers and many employees know that the employee had 3 months in which to bring a claim in the Employment Tribunal for unfair dismissal and many of the other employment remedies



The 3 months runs from the Effective Date of Termination. When is that, when the employer sends notice of instant dismissal by post?



Is it when the letter is posted? Is it when it arrives? Is it when the employee has had a reasonable opportunity to read the letter? Is it when it is read?



The answer is: when the employee has had a reasonable opportunity to read the letter!



It will be appreciated that this introduces uncertainty. The better course of action is to insist upon a face-to-face interview with the employee and dismiss the employee at that meeting

Labels: employment notice effective date termination

A landlord must respond promptly to a request for a licence to assign and if he is minded to refuse, then he should give reasons. These must be comprehensive. He cannot think of new ones later



If the tenants application for a licence to assign is incomplete, in that it does not contain enough information, then the landlord should simply reject the application, giving reasons/saying what is missing



The tenant will have to make another application

Labels: landlord unreasonable licence assign

Do not assume that any date inserted into a commercial contract is a final one; assume it is more of a target rather than a final date after which certain consequences flow



In order to make that date final, add the words "time to be of the essence"

Labels: Long stop date commercial contract