Last 3 months headlines – Page 1550
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Sentencing
Custodial sentences – Return to custody – Sentence length R v Jamie Costello: CA (Crim Div) (Lord Justice Hughes (vice-president), Mr Justice Mackay, Mr Justice Lloyd Jones): 2 March 2010 ...
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Civil procedure
Admissibility – Civil recovery proceedings – Proceeds of crime Ronald Olden v Serious Organised Crime Agency: CA (Civ Div) (Lords Justice Rix, Wilson, Sir Scott Baker): 26 February 2010 The ...
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Family law
Human rights – Local government – Care proceedings – Child sexual abuse – Cross examination Re W (children): SC (Lady Hale, Lords Walker, Brown, Mance, Kerr): 3 March 2010 The ...
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Heir of the dog
Family lawyers know only too well that divorcing couples all too often end up fighting like cat and dog over their finances, children and homes. So as we know they are increasingly making prenuptial agreements to head off the acrimony. But according to one Manchester solicitor, pets can also be ...
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Wildest dreams
As any successful orator knows, there is nothing quite like ‘sexual shenanigans’ to liven up an otherwise dry, albeit erudite, presentation. Obiter was reminded of this during Mr Justice Eady’s address at the launch of City University’s new Centre for Law, Justice and Journalism. Eady galloped through the history of ...
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Grim peeper
A new hot (sic) topic is currently being debated in the world of indirect tax – what VAT should apply to peep shows? A legal update sent out by chambers 2 Bedford Row reveals that the owner of a sex shop in Bruges has appealed against a tax authority’s decision ...
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The Eagle has landed
National firm DLA Piper swooshed past rivals to win the Midlands Corporate Ski Challenge this year, with Nick Jew, Craig Armstrong and Nicky Randle beating 50 or so challengers to take the prize in the first year the firm entered the competition.
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Memory lane
Law Society’s Gazette, March 1950 H. Nevil Smart, C.M.G., O.B.E, J.P, President of the Law Society, reminiscing to students at the Society’s school of law.
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Proposals to restrict the right to prosecute ‘universal jurisdiction’ offences
Lawfare was first defined in 2001 as ‘the use of law as a weapon of war’. Last week, it was the focus of an important conference in New York organised by the newly-established Lawfare Project. The metaphor of war is never far from the courtroom. ...
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Tools for the job
I write in response to the letter headed ‘Tools of the trade’ (see [2010] Gazette, 18 February, 11). I disagree entirely with the sweeping assumption that state-educated students do not gain the skills to obtain a professional qualification.
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Reality bites
I read the articles by Lucy Scott-Moncrieff and Adam Makepeace with interest (see [2010] Gazette, 11 March, 12). I was formerly a sole practitioner for over 20 years, involved in mental health work all that time. I have been working with Duncan Lewis as a freelance consultant mental health solicitor ...
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Down the food chain
I read with interest last week’s item about legal aid business models (see [2010] Gazette, 11 March, 12). As far as family law is concerned, the 2010 fee structure and the way that solicitors in private practice are now audited (they must have documentary evidence of means on file when ...
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Proceed with care
I note the concerns expressed by Christina Blacklaws in your report on the Supreme Court decision in Re W (Children) about children giving evidence in court proceedings (see [2010] Gazette, 11 March, 2).
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Calling for a legal duty to inform patients of medical errors or incidents
by Paul Sankeya partner at Russell Jones & Walker. He specialises in clinical negligence and is a member of the specialist Law Society and AvMA clinical negligence panels At the age of 39, Colin Freeman’s life fell apart when he suffered a severe and disabling stroke. ...
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Solicitor HCAs v the bar – the debate rages on
‘If you’re not bar, you won’t go far,’ one rueful lawyer noted after Judge Gledhill QC aimed his now notorious broadside at three solicitor higher court advocates last year (see [2009] Gazette, 23 April, 1). June Venters meanwhile, the first female solicitor QC, described prejudice from the bar and bench ...
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Chambers of Commerce seek 'fast-track' employment claims
Low-value employment claims should be fast-tracked and dealt with through mediation, the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) recommended this week. Claims for less than £3,000 should be resolved within three months, the BCC said in a report on employment regulation. It claimed that employment cases are ...
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Supreme Court divorce decision could ‘open the floodgates’
The Supreme Court’s decision to top up the financial award made to a divorcee by a Nigerian court could ‘open the floodgates to forum shopping’ and further clog the London courts, family lawyers have warned. The court ruled that a settlement reached in a Nigerian ...
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Mental health programme following ‘political agenda’
A programme costing £60m a year to detain and treat 350 mentally ill offenders is following a ‘political agenda’ with no benefit to society or the detainees, a leading mental health lawyer has warned.
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Booming African economies offer lucrative opportunities for UK law firms
The booming economies of sub-Saharan Africa offer lucrative opportunities for British law firms, but only if firms engage with local lawyers on equal terms and are not there just to make a ‘quick buck’, leading African lawyers have warned. The average growth in gross domestic product ...
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CPS to recruit new lawyers to improve 'poor' performance
The new head of London’s Crown Prosecution Service has announced it will recruit 42 new lawyers in a bid to improve service following a review that found performance in over a third of the capital’s boroughs was ‘poor’. The report of Her Majesty’s CPS Inspectorate on ...