The Government has announced that the right to request flexible working will extend to all employees from 30 June 2014. At the moment, only employees who have children under 17 (18 if the child is disabled) or other caring duties are able to request flexible working under the statutory regime. The new provisions had been due to come into force in April but delays to the Children and Families Bill caused a set-back. The Bill is expected to receive Royal Assent in March ...
The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) has recently published a Q&A document on the application of the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive. The Q&A includes information on a number of matters, including the application of the remuneration rules. A copy has been added to the resources page of our AIFMD microsite ...
On January 31, 2014, the Supreme Court of Canada released its decision in A.I. Enterprises Ltd. v. Bram Enterprises Ltd., 2014 SCC 12. This is an important commercial decision as it clarifies and narrows the scope of the tort of unlawful interference in economic relations. Canadian businesses will also welcome the Court's reference to commercial certainty as one of the principal reasons to clarify and limit the scope of this tort ...
When Shakespeare said we should kill all lawyers he was not referring to Magic Circle corporate or TMT partners, they had not been invented yet; and conveyancing and private client work were in their infancy. No, what he had in his sights were litigators and two hundred and fifty years later Dickens aimed his withering fire at the chancery lawyers in Bleak House ...
The HMRC policy on deduction of VAT on costs relating to investment management activities of an occupation pension scheme has altered with effect from 3 February 2014. The HMRC has confirmed that a pension scheme employer may be entitled to deduct VAT paid on services relating to the administration of its pension scheme and management of assets of the pension fund ...
On February 5, 2014, the Minister of Labour announced that as of May 1, 2014, the minimum wage will be increased by $0.20 an hour to $10.35 an hour. The hourly minimum wage of employees receiving tips will be increased to $8.90 an hour, which represents an increase of $0.15 an hour. Finally, the minimum wage payable to raspberry or strawberry pickers will continue to be established on a per kilogram picked basis. From May 1, 2014, this rate will be increased to $3 ...
In the recent case of Re Storm Funding Ltd, the High Court held that where contribution notices (CN) are issued to a number of companies following the failure to comply with a financial support direction:The contribution notices may in aggregate require payment of more than the actual employer debt in the scheme - a single contribution notice cannot be for more than that amount; and It follows that, under these multiple contribution notices, there scheme may recover more than t
Reprinted with permission from the February 7, 2014 issue of Corporate Counsel. © 2014 ALM Media Properties, LLC. Further duplication without permission is prohibited. All rights reserved. On Nov. 12, 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to grant a writ of certiorari in Cariou v. Prince, leaving intact the decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit on copyright fair use in the context of appropriation art ...
Last December, the Minister of Employment and Social Solidarity unveiled the Quebec government's action plan with the goal of [translation] "correcting and restoring the situation of pension plans" ...
Many companies provide annual earnings guidance and quarterly updates to the analyst and investor communities. Guidance is also frequently updated during industry conferences and in nondeal roadshows. A failure to meet the market’s earnings expectations can negatively impact management’s credibility and, in turn, the price of the company’s common stock. The importance of earnings guidance is heightened during an equity offering when a company is actively soliciting investors ...
False labeling of products, fake or inferior materials and components used to make products, and the misappropriated use of another’s trademark are examples of how counterfeit goods and the theft of intellectual property are hurting consumers and companies. The world markets and global supply distribution chains provide opportunities for companies to grow and prosper. Sales through the Internet allow for products to be sold and sent to almost anywhere in the world ...
"Should I stay or should I go?" may be the question an employee asks himself when he faces a difficult working environment and considers filing for constructive dismissal. Constructive dismissal is when an employer indirectly encourages an employee to resign by failing to comply with the employment contract or one sidedly changing the employment terms without the employee's consent ...
On January 16, 2014, the Supreme Court of Canada1 affirmed the Court of Appeal of Québec2 judgment which authorized the class action brought against Vivendi Canada Inc. (“Vivendi”). This important decision confirms, among other things, that the rules for authorizing class actions in Quebec are more liberal than those in the common law provinces. THE FACTS Seagram Ltd. (“Seagram”), which was established in 1857, is a producer of wine and spirits ...
The Serbian Government has taken first steps of implementing a new court system with the passing of a new Law on Seats, Jurisdictions of Courts and Public Prosecution Offices (Official Gazette RS no. 101/2013), and amendments to the Law on Organisation of Courts (Official Gazette RS no. 116/2008, 104/2009, 101/2010, 31/2011, 78/2011 101/2011, 101/2013), which came into force on 1 January 2014 ...
The dispute resolution terms of engineering contracts can cause problems. An example is the recent case of Tubular Holdings (Pty) Ltd v DBT Technologies (Pty) Ltd, an unreported decision of South Gautend High Court. DBT Technologies - a subcontractor to Eskom in the Kusile Project 0 further contracted to Tubular Holdings in a deal worth some R 1.3 billion. Contract FIDIC's clause 20 governs the dispute resolution procedure. Clause 20 ...
The Court of Appeal of Québec recently ruled on the criteria for distinguishing between an employment agreement and a contract for services in the case of Bermex international inc. v. Agence du revenu du Québec.1 It is worth noting that regardless of the fact that the parties labelled their agreement as a contract for services or an agreement with a self-employed worker, such a description is not binding on a court ...
Effective January 1, 2014, the International Chamber of Commerce (“ICC”) replaced its Amicable Dispute Resolution rules with new Mediation Rules. The new ICC Mediation Rules (the “Rules”) set clear parameters for mediating disputes, while also providing for additional flexible procedures that allow the parties to resolve their disputes privately and confidentially ...
A New York appellate court affirmed in Syracuse Univ. v. National Union Fire Ins. Co., CA 13-01056, (N.Y. Sup. Ct. App. Div. Dec. 27, 2013), that an insurer must pay the costs incurred by its policyholder to comply with subpoenas issued to the policyholder as part of a criminal investigation, even where formal charges are not filed ...
Haynes and Boone, LLP’s Immigration Practice Group reminds employers with a need for Cap-Subject H-1B petitions – those applications that are subject to the annual numerical limit – that the filing window for Fiscal Year 2015 is about to open. Over the last three years, the Cap has been reached at a much earlier date. For Fiscal Year 2014, the Cap was reached within the first week of the filing period, which ended on April 5, 2013 ...
Based on a review of recent district court cases, uncertainty remains regarding the proper standard for certifying a Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) collective action in the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. The absence of a definitive test remains because the Fifth Circuit, in March 2013, avoided the opportunity to apply a stricter certification standard than the one the courts have been using. Apparently, the district courts are holding out for more definitive guidance ...
In Ass’n For Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, Inc., the Supreme Court held that "a naturally occurring DNA segment is a product of nature and not patent eligible merely because it has been isolated, but that cDNA is patent eligible because it is not naturally occurring." 133 S. Ct. 1207 (2013). Further, fragments that are "indistinguishable from natural DNA" are not statutory subject matter. Id., 2119 ...
On January 2, the Antitrust Division of the US Department of Justice (DOJ) announced its first civil enforcement action of 2014 — a consummated merger challenge and settlement resulting from Heraeus Electro-Nite’s (Heraeus’s) $42 million acquisition of Midwest Instrument Company Inc. (Minco). The enforcement action is the latest DOJ challenge to a merger not required to be reported to the US antitrust agencies under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ...
What North Carolina Law Says Employers have often ignored a separation notice from the Employment Security Commission and not provided any details as to reason for separation because it was not being contested or it was a non-charging situation. Ignoring the notices is no longer a good choice ...
RELIEF MEASURES EXTENSION On November 27, 2013, the Government of Québec published the Regulation Providing New Relief Measures for the Funding of Solvency Deficiencies of Pension Plans in the Private Sector (the “New Regulation”), which will come into effect on December 31, 2013 ...
