All articles by Eduardo Reyes – Page 34
-
News
Shrill reaction from Fiji
Fiji’s interim government craves democratic legitimacy. Yet its members, and a supportive armed services, are unwilling to consider any option that carries the risk of losing power, or being held personally responsible for, actions they took to gain or hold power.
-
News
Banks could not accept the financial products market was saturated
Disputes over interest rate hedging (derivatives) products sold by banks are in the news again this week – this time US state and local governments are looking at whether the products were ‘mis-sold’ and whether they have a case. Closer to home, as predicted by UK lawyers I spoke to ...
-
News
‘Monstrous’ NGO prosecutions in Fiji
Contempt proceedings have been brought by the government of Fiji against a non-governmental organisation for quoting from a Law Society Charity report on the country. The Citizens Constitutional Forum, which supports community education and advocacy in relation to Fiji's Constitution, democracy, human rights and multiculturalism, ...
-
News
Law firm profit divide continues to widen
Revenue has fallen at a quarter of firms over the last year, and the gap in both profitability and growth in turnover between London and the rest of the UK continued to widen. In most firms headcount has remained static or fallen. These are the ...
-
News
UK ‘miscarriages’ model rejected by South Australia
South Australia is now highly unlikely to adopt a UK-style Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), following a report by the parliament’s legislative review committee. The committee also cautioned against the creation of a CCRC at a national level.
-
News
Barclays’ Libor fixing ‘voided’ swaps deals
Barclays’ manipulation of the London inter-bank offered rate (Libor) may have rendered tens of thousands of customer agreements that reference Libor ‘void’, according to a £12m claim against the bank. The case could open the way to claims for sums far exceeding direct losses incurred through Libor manipulation, admitted in ...
-
News
‘Bill of Rights’ consultation shows how bad laws get made
For anyone curious to see the process of rubbish ideas being turned into statutes that operate sub-optimally, I recommend reading the second consultation of the ‘Commission on a Bill of Rights’. This is not to say that Sir Hugh Lewis, the commission’s chair, is ...
-
News
LinkedIn 'can help profession innovate'
‘Crowd-sourced’ innovations can help lawyers temper the worst excesses of government cuts to access to justice, incoming Law Society president Lucy Scott-Moncrieff said this week.
-
News
IRA interviews judgment - history is the loser
This week a US appeal court was asked to choose between the value of law and justice on the one hand, and the value of political stability and academic history on the other. In ordering Boston College to hand over interviews conducted for an oral history project with a convicted ...
-
News
Law Society steps up pressure on Fiji
Fiji’s continued refusal to allow foreign scrutiny of its rule of law has come under public criticism from outgoing Law Society president John Wotton. Wotton’s move follows the publication of a highly critical report by the Law Society Charity, first revealed in the Gazette.
-
News
Barclays ‘faces $6bn in Libor scandal claims’
Barclays Bank Plc could face claims totalling $6bn globally following revelations that staff members were involved in the manipulation of the London inter-bank offered rate (Libor), the Gazette has learned.
-
News
A lawyer should run Barclays
I think I have a solution to the crisis of confidence in our banks - starting with the current vacancy at Barclays, let us put lawyers at the helm of all the important ones. As what has gone awry in recent decades catches up with banks’ chief executives, do not ...
-
News
FSA and banks buy time and credibility on swaps claims
City regulator the Financial Services Authority’s announcement that it has agreed with major banks the terms of a settlement ‘scheme’ to compensate business owners who were mis-sold interest rate swaps (IRS) products relieves some of the enormous pressure that the banks and the FSA itself has been under.
-
News
Steer clear of CMCs, financial watchdog warns bank litigants
City regulator the Financial Services Authority has cautioned small business owners against using claims management companies (CMCs). The warning comes at the end of a damning report on the mis-selling of interest rate hedging products which highlighted banks’ ‘poor sales practices across a number of products’.
-
News
Mis-selling claim papers sent to FSA
Court papers from an ongoing interest rate swap mis-selling claim obtained by the Gazette have been submitted to the Financial Services Authority (FSA) by the MP leading parliamentary scrutiny of the products’ sale to UK businesses.
-
News
Progress report on Lord Justice Jackson's civil justice reforms
In public, Sir Rupert Jackson (pictured) is circumspect about the government’s implementation of civil justice reforms based on his report. In private, he could be forgiven for feeling disappointment over the execution of changes to which he has lent his name. In addition to time ...
-
News
The bell-curve tolls for government lawyers
The most interesting parts of Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude’s ‘Civil Service Reform Plan’ do not occupy much space in the 30-page document released this week. Controversial proposals on ‘managing poor performance’ are tucked away at the back, on the page before ‘delivering an Olympic ...
-
News
Banking giant faces landmark mis-selling case
Key defences relied on by banks in interest rate swap (IRS) mis-selling claims are set to be tested in court this October when the claim of business-owner Sara Pearson against Barclays comes to trial.
-
News
Law Conference 2012 preview
In the original Star Wars film, answering Luke Skywalker’s scepticism about the space-worthiness of his ship the Millennium Falcon (‘What a piece of junk!’), interplanetary smuggler Han Solo reassures the young traveller: ‘She may not look like much but she's got it where it counts, kid. I've made a lot ...
-
News
CofE’s wedding rules can be elastic when it wants them to be
Is the Church of England taking a consistent moral line over gay marriage? At one level it would be nice to think so. While I do not share the church’s opposition to same-sex marriage, no one is truly comfortable with tales of parents feigning faith to obtain a church school ...