Recently, there have been a number of interesting judgments of the South African Labour Court regarding cost orders and new approaches have been adopted which signal a change as to how cost orders are approached in the Labour Court. Section 162 of the Labour Relations Act, 1995 (“LRA”) states that the Labour Court has discretion regarding the granting of cost orders, which is not dependent of the nature of the claim brought before the court ...
Recent case law has shown that the South African courts are prepared to hold employers liable for conduct amounting to sexual harassment perpetrated by their employees. The basis for such liability arises from two sources. The first is the common law duty imposed on employers to create and maintain a safe working environment free from the danger of being sexually harassed ...
The Affordable Care Act ("ACA") is alive and well, despite renewed legal challenges and the elimination of the “individual mandate” beginning next year. While the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act reduced the tax penalty for individuals who don’t have health coverage to $0, effective for 2019, employers continue to be subject to penalties for failing to comply with certain ACA rules ...
In a recent judgement the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) concluded that an administrator of a Facebook fan page has independent obligations under European data protection law, and will be considered joint controller with Facebook for some processing activities ...
The Communications Decency Act (CDA)—the law Congress enacted in 1996 and confirmed this past year to shield online publishers from responsibility for the speech of others—gives internet platforms the right to publish the ideas and opinions of third-party users without being held liable for that content or being forced to remove it.[1] In the closely watched case ofHassell v ...
The question of 'employment status', continues to concern many employers working within today's 'gig economy'. The UK Supreme Court recently provided guidance on the correct "label" to be bestowed on 'gig economy' workers. Pimlico Plumbers recently lost an appeal in the UK Courts against a finding that one of its plumbers was a "worker" for the purposes of relevant UK employment legislation – not a self-employed independent contractor ...
Earlier this year, in an effort to clarify what types of employee handbook rules are lawful under the National Labor Relations Act (“NLRA”), the General Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB”) issued new 1Guidance on the topic. Determining which rules are permissible and which may violate the NLRA has troubled both union and non-union employers in recent years due to the Obama-era NLRB’s tendency to find that standard handbook rules (e.g ...
Last year, California employers faced a swell of new city and county labor laws that increased employers’ local minimum wage obligations. Several of these local ordinances included incremental increases that went into effect over time, including many increases that are effective as of July 1, 2018. In addition to meeting the state’s minimum wage requirements ($10.50/hour for employers with 25 or fewer employees, and $11 ...
Walking the tight rope between making strides for women’s rights and being too strident So, the Trump-Kim Summit has successfully concluded in Singapore, with the Leader of the Free World shaking hands with the Supreme Leader of one of its most coldblooded dictatorships. Looking at these two scions of privilege, it is hard not to be struck by how much they have in common, united not just by their comically bad hair, but also by their low regard for women ...
As rapid technological changes in the 21st century continue to expand the types and volume of private electronic information, the Fourth Amendment’s privacy protections are evolving. Originally, “Fourth Amendment jurisprudence was tied to common-law trespass” and provided protections against searches of property. See, United States v. Jones, 565 U.S. 400, 405 (2012) ...
After not disturbing the Third-Party Doctrine for more than 40 years, the Supreme Court created a significant exception to it inCarpenter v. United States. Slip Op., 16-402 (Jun. 22, 2018). Under the Third-Party Doctrine, individuals who voluntarily provide personal information to third parties are deemed to relinquish their legitimate reasonable expectation of privacy in that information ...
Download the June 2018 edition of the Haynes and Boone OSHA Newsletter PDF. No Time Limit on Look Back Period for Repeat Citations InTriumph Constr. Corp. v. Sec’y of Labor, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a look back period for a repeat violation beyond the Commission’s “general” policy of three years to determine a repeat violation. InTriumph, an employee was injured in a cave-in at an excavation site ...
In a unanimous vote on June 28, 2018, California lawmakers enacted a landmark, first-of-its-kind data privacy law that is intended to give consumers greater control over how their personal information is collected, stored, and sold by companies with whom they do business ...
In a significant decision for all public agencies, yesterday the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a 5-4 decision that the First Amendment prohibits public employees from being compelled to pay what are known as “agency fees” when they choose not to join their union. Janus v. AFSCME, No. 16-1466 (June 27, 2018). In so holding, the Court overruled its 1977 decision in Abood v. Detroit Board of Education, 431 U.S. 209 (1977) ...
Employers may continue to rely on rounding systems that are neutral in policy and in practice. On June 25, 2018, the California Court of Appeal issued its decision in AHMC Healthcare, Inc. v. Superior Court of Los Angeles County (Letona), finding legal an employer's use of a payroll system that automatically rounds employee time up or down to the nearest quarter hour ...
Artificial intelligence technologies are extremely promising in healthcare.1 By examining, cross-referencing and comparing a phenomenal amount of data.2 AI lets researchers work more quickly at a lower cost3 and facilitates doctors’ decision-making with regard to diagnosis, treatment and choice of prescription. The integration of AI into the healthcare field can take various forms:4 Management of electronic medical records (e.g ...
Ferdose al-Taie, Dallas-based senior counsel in Dykema’s Commercial Litigation group, authored the article “Anonymous Whistleblowers Make Millions for Reporting Their Own Companies to Federal Regulators,” forFOCUS, the quarterly newsletter of the Association of Corporate Counsel (ACC) South Central Texas Chapter. In the article, al-Taie shines a light on the ins and outs of Dodd-Frank Whistleblower awards and who is eligible for consideration ...
This week, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) issued final rules to expand access to “Association Health Plans” for small businesses that are unaffiliated, but are in the same line of business or geographic area. An “Association Health Plan” or “AHP” is a group health plan adopted by members of an employer group or association to provide health coverage for their employees ...
In the Loop: With the Hanson Bridgett Government Group Many of us have had to request reimbursement from our company for an expense, which can be a pretty complicated process. For members of a legislative body, these rules can be even more specific. We'll think about Buddy, who sits on city council. Not long ago, the City gave Buddy a city-owned tablet to allow him to do his job remotely ...
Local Minimum Wage Increases Several California cities and counties have passed their own minimum wage ordinances with a more aggressive schedule of minimum wage increases. Local minimum wage increases that go into effect on July 1, 2018 include the following: Locality Minimum Wage Eff. 7/1/18 Belmont* $12.50 Emeryville Small business (55 or fewer employees): $15.00 Large business (56 or more employees): $15.69
Despite its coming into force in 2001, the courts have frequently avoided commenting on the application and interpretation of the Act to Establish a Legal Framework for Information Technologies1 (hereafter the “LFIT Act”), preferring instead to rely on the provisions in the Civil Code of Québec2. In the decision of Benisty v. Kloda3, judge Jacques J ...
Should The Bahamas be at the forefront of cryptocurrency regulatory policy by implementing smart, flexible regulation that encourages the legitimate operators in the sub-sector to bloom or should we leave well enough alone?The Bahamas’ position in the landscape of the cryptocurrencies is a familiar one to many in the traditional financial services economy - they’ll know this story all too well with the growth, development, and decline of private banking: a new and exciting innovation
On June 6, 2018, the NLRB General Counsel ("GC") issued a memorandum (GC 18-04) to all Regional Offices directing them to recognize certain types of workplace rules as generally lawful. This guidance should provide employers with greater assurance and clarity regarding acceptable workplace rules under the National Labor Relations Act ("NLRA") ...
On June 1, 2018, the Los Angeles County Superior Court granted a Defendant’s Motion to Compel Individual Arbitrations of the two Plaintiffs’ wage claims, dismissed the class claims and stayed the action with regard to the remaining Private Attorney Generals Act (PAGA) claim. The Court, in Navarrete v. Louis Vuitton, Case No ...
