With regard to the professional obligations of a lawyer, is it possible outside the physical confines of the tribunal to let a judge know exactly what he thinks of him? Should the response be negative, does it not unduly restrain his right to freedom of expression otherwise guaranteed to all by virtue of the charters of rights and freedoms? This is the question to which the Court of Appeal had to respond recently by rendering judgment in the case of Doré v ...
The Pay Equity Act (hereinafter the “Act”) celebrated its 10th anniversary in 2006. To mark the occasion, the Commission de l’équité salariale took stock of what had been achieved. After completing this analysis, on May 27, 2009, the National Assembly passed Bill 25, which made several amendments to the Act. These amendments came into force on May 28, 2009 ...
The Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009 (the "Act") received Royal Assent on 12 November 2009. Among other things it introduces a new statutory right for employees to request time off from work to study or train. From 6 April 2010 the new right only applies to employers with 250 or more employees. It is expected to apply to all other employers from 6 April 2011 ...
Some unexpected changes have highlighted the introduction of new employee share scheme legislation, which received Royal Assent on 14 December 2009. Companies will need to give the legislation close consideration given the impact it will have on employee equity plans, particularly the drafting of plan rules and offer documents ...
The concern expressed in our last Australian Legal Update about the possibility of Australia following most of the rest of the developed world into recession fortunately proved unfounded. Australia has been a notable exception to the experience of many other countries in this respect ...
In light of recent case law on who properly qualifies as the employer of employees hired through an employment agency, it is essential for every organization to review its operating procedures to be sure of their legal and financial implications. This review, which we perform on behalf of managers of facilities in the heath-care industry, is effective in ensuring the sound management of the organization and preventing litigation ...
The United States Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) announced that, as part of President Obama’s recently proposed budget for Fiscal Year (FY) 2011, the PTO’s budget would be $2.322 billion, a 23 percent increase over FY 2010. This significant budget increase is part of PTO Director Kappos’ long term plan for increasing PTO examination efficiency and decreasing the backlog of applications ...
During negotiation of the Good Friday Agreement, it was suggested that sometimes "we all have to jump together". Having read through the Local Government and Communities Committee Report published on 28th January 2010 following an inquiry into Local Government Finances, this quote has particular resonance. While there is perhaps nothing new in the report, it is certainly timely as local government works its way through the budget setting exercise for 2010/11 ...
Yesterday, January 26, 2010, Judge David Hittner of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas issued an important opinion in the Stanford Financial case that paves the way for targets of criminal and civil enforcement proceedings to obtain insurance coverage for costs of defending themselves ...
On January 1, 2010 the Federal law “On amendment the Federal Law “On the employment of the population in the Russian Federation” (hereinafter – the “Law”) came into force. The Law provides for the equal rights to the dismissed citizens, who worked under employment contract with individual entrepreneurs and to those who were dismissed from legal entities ...
The fifth anniversary has just passed of the Constitutional Court’s 2004 ruling which declared that Article 158 and certain other articles of the Manpower Law in relation to serious misconduct were against the Indonesian Constitution. Effectively, an employer could not immediately terminate an employee for serious misconduct but had to wait for a court judgment of guilt before initiating termination ...
Seeking a state purchasing contract? You may now be required to register as a lobbyist. Some independent contractors who help vendors secure procurement contracts in Texas are now required to register with the Texas Ethics Commission.1 House Bill 3445, which the Texas Legislature passed last spring during the 81st Texas Legislative Session, established new guidelines for lobbying activities related to state procurement contracts ...
With the current recessionary climate there has been a significant increase in redundancies and other dismissals. This has led to an inevitable increase in the use of compromise agreements whereby an employee signs a document agreeing not to bring particular employment or contractual claims in exchange for a financial settlement.Here we look at some of the key issues in considering how termination payments could be structured ...
Over the last ten years, Quebec soc iety has frequently been called on to establ ish means for integrating human rights in the workplace, particularly with respect to accommodation matters ...
In the case of Leung Ka Lau & Ors v The Hospital Authority [2006] HKEC 399, doctors working in public hospitals successfully claimed compensation in the Court of First Instance for "rest days" and "holidays" for which they had been deprived but lost their claim on compensation for "overtime" worked (Please refer to our newsletter issue 2006.2) ...
The decision by presiding judge William Stone has overruled the Labour Tribunal decision in January 2009 and allowed the appeal of Cathay Pacific. The Tribunal presiding officer held that line duty and ground duty allowances could be characterized as "daily wages". They were recurrent in nature, calculated on a daily basis and directly related to the number of hours worked ...
Winning the case against its flight attendants, Cathay Pacific loses against a group of pilots they sacked during a 2001 industrial dispute. The airline, one of Asia's biggest, was ordered to pay damages to each of the 18 pilots whose employment had been terminated by Cathay Pacific ...
The statutory Minimum Wage Bill (the "Bill") was gazetted on 26 June 2009 and tabled at the Hong Kong Legislative Council on 8 July 2009. The Bill will require every employer to pay employees minimum wage at an hourly rate, however it does not seek to regulate the number of hours that employees spend at work ...
In a decision that stands as a cautionary note to trustees of pension and benefit plans, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice has found the Trustees of the Canadian Commercial Workers Industry Pension Plan (the "Plan") guilty of breaching the investment rules applicable to pension plans in Ontario. 1. The Facts in Christophe The Plan’s portfolio is valued at approximately $1 billion ...
On 1 September 2009, the long-anticipated Social Security Agreement between the Kingdom of Belgium and the Republic of India (the “SSA”) entered into force. The SSA was signed in New Delhi on 3 November 2006 and is considered as a landmark agreement as it was the first treaty of its kind to be signed by the Indian authorities. Therefore it is likely to serve as a benchmark for similar agreements between India and other countries ...
At this moment, according to the Brazilian Constitution, employees may not work more than 44 hours per week. Also, whenever employees work overtime, the hourly rates are increased by at least 50%. Yet, a Constitutional Amendment Bill is being discussed in Brazilian House of Representatives in order to change such provisions. Bill no ...
In its Sea Judgement of 10 September 2009 (C-573/07), the European Court of Justice (ECJ) further clarifies its “in-house” jurisprudence. More specifically, it goes more deeply into the notion of control ...
In Belgium, contracting agreements are subject to the Belgian Civil Code (‘BCC’) plus several other regulations. In this article, we briefly discuss five rules which foreign investors or principals may be surprised apply to Belgian contracting agreements. Make sure you avoid these pitfalls!1 ...
The Acoset judgment of the ECJ dated 15 October 2009 (C-196/08) was related to a dispute about an institutionalised public-private partnership (IPPP). A local authority wanted to grant a concession to a newly-created semi-public company, whose minority shareholder would be a private company selected by an open tender procedure. The minority shareholder would be responsible for the operations of the semi-public company ...
In the Horizon Pleiades case, the Council of State was confronted with an interesting question: if a public authority organises a procedure to select its partner for a PPP company, which will perform works or services which would normally be covered by the Procurement Directives, does the selection procedure have to comply with the rules laid down in the Procurement Directives or can a “light” selection procedure be used? In its ruling, dated 19 June 2009, the Council of Stat
