Earlier this year, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its long-awaited decision in Epic Systems Corp. v. Lewis, resolving an issue on which several Courts of Appeals and various federal agencies and administrations had disagreed. At issue in Epic Systems (and two companion cases presenting the same issue: Ernst & Young LLP. v. Morris and National Labor Relations Board v. Murphy Oil USA, Inc ...
As Lord Sumption’s leading judgment of the Supreme Court inRock Advertising Limited v MWB Business Exchange Centres Limited[2018] UKSC 24 states, it is rare that modern litigation raises truly fundamental issues in the law of contract. This case, however, raisedtwosuch issues, although as a result of the Court’s decision on the first issue, it was not necessary to decide the “difficult” second issue ...
The approval of the long awaited Federal Law on Arbitration by the Federal National Council was announced earlier this year ...
The International Labor Organization (ILO) defines sexual harassment as “any conduct of unwanted sexual nature that, according to the reasonable perception of the recipient, interferes with their work, is established as a condition of employment or creates an intimidating hostile or offensive work environment ...
Abu Dhabi has introduced new rules governing the functioning of the Emirate’s judiciary. The new rules appear in Abu Dhabi Law 13 of 2018, which amends Abu Dhabi Law 23 of 2006 on the Abu Dhabi Judicial Department. The new provisions largely address internal matters related to the functioning of the courts, such as the composition of panels of the courts and the accountability of judges. But two features could be of more general interest ...
A common question we receive from school systems relates to whether certain employees (both service personnel and professional personnel) recapture their seniority if there has been a break in their employment with the school system but they later return to employment. Often a break in employment is the result of a voluntary break or unfortunately a reduction in force ...
By this time next year, Singapore will have a rather different employment regime from any it has had since independence. One aspect of this needs to be carefully thought through. About ten years ago, a distressed Norwegian client consulted me. His company’s Singapore office had a toxic employee who not only performed poorly and shirked responsibility, but was also habitually insubordinate to management and offensive to his peers ...
The Administrative provisions that set forth the guidelines for comprehensive management of waste requiring special management in the hydrocarbons sector (the “Guidelines”) were published in Mexico’s Federal Official Gazette on May 2, 2018 and became effective the following day ...
The National Hydrocarbons Commission (“CNH”) announced on April 26, 2018, the so-called “farmout” bid process CNH-A-C6-7 Asociaciones/2018. This new bid round comprises seven onshore conventional blocks for exploration and production that are located in the states of Veracruz, Tabasco and Chiapas, covering collectively 4,580.8 km2. CNH estimates these blocks have conventional prospective resources of approximately 405.1 million barrels of crude oil equivalent ...
On April 30, 2018, the California Supreme Court rejected a delivery company’s challenge to a trial court’s decision to certify a class of delivery drivers in a wage and hour class action case, embracing a standard that presumes workers are employees instead of independent contractors. The high court’s ruling adopts a much broader definition of the term “employ,” which as a result expands the meaning of the term “employee ...
On April 30, 2018, the California Supreme Court in Dynamex Operations West Inc. v. Superior Court (Case No. S222732) modified the test for determining whether a worker is an independent contractor for purposes of California wage orders. The Court expanded the definition of "employee" and rejected its long-standing independent contractor test ...
Earlier this year, Prime Minister Theresa May said the government wanted to, “secure broad energy cooperation with the EU”, including by, “exploring options for the UK’s continued participation in the EU’s internal energy market” ...
EPA Administrator Pruitt recently issued another policy to help streamline the New Source Review (NSR) Program. After receiving comments from many industry sources that the NSR Program should be reformed given its heavy time and cost burden, the Trump EPA has made reforming the NSR Program a priority ...
Earlier this year, Mexico´s Senate approved the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (“CPTPP”) formerly known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership ("TPP"). The CPTPP will enter into force once six of its members ratify the Treaty pursuant to their internal legal procedures. Mexico is the first member to ratify the Treaty ...
In March 2018, the new Serbian Law on Foreigners was adopted, replacing the 2008 version of this law- in force until recently without any amendments. The new law will enter into force on 3 October 2018 ...
Artificial intelligence is a burning topic in many sectors today and the legal industry is no exception. Recently, at the World Services Group’s annual employment law1 conference held in February, AI was heavily debated along with its’ impact not only on the legal profession, lawyers, clients, the way business is done, but also our traditional understanding of concepts such as “law” or “justice” ...
Personnel Season is nearly over for county boards of education. Now that Personnel Season is coming to an end, a common question we often see relates to W. Va. Code 18A-4-7a(k)(2) and how to handle the statutory provision of reserving vacancies for individual professionals subject to release (i.e. reduced in force) ...
An increased number of corporate transactions and mergers have been observed in the oil and gas sector on the Norwegian Continental Shelf (NCS) in recent years. Several oil majors and traditional utilities and downstream companies have reduced their presence and, to some extent, been replaced by smaller companies, including start-ups backed by private equity ...
Employers in New York City and New York State will be required to conduct mandatory sexual harassment training and take other steps designed to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace in response to new legislation passed by the City and the State. New York City On April 11, 2018, the New York City Council passed the Stop Sexual Harassment in New York City Act, which is expected to be signed promptly by Mayor de Blasio ...
View the PDF version of the April 2018 IP Beacon. Are Works Generated by AI Subject to IP Protection? When Philip Dick wrote the 1968 novel "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?," the inspiration for the 1982 film "Blade Runner," artificial intelligence was more fiction than science. Fifty years later, theHarvard Business Reviewpredicts that AI will be the single biggest technological development of our era, as transformative as the steam engine or electricity ...
On April 12, 2018, the U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL) Wage Hour Division released three opinion letters regarding the legality of certain arrangements under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), and Title III of the Consumer Credit Protection Act (CCPA). The first letter addresses a question commonly faced by employers—whether an employee is entitled to compensation for time spent traveling away from the employee’s home community ...
In our GDPR for Employers guide, we look at the key areas where employers will need to implement change and how to manage the impact of these regulations on the business ...
Due in part to the #MeToo movement, employers have experienced an influx of workplace sexual harassment claims. More than ever, employers have been reminded of their legal and ethical duties to create harassment-free workplaces. These duties involve preventing foreseeable sexual harassment including proactively training employees about discrimination and harassment. This also entails properly investigating sexual harassment claims and immediately correcting known harassment ...
The decision in National Education Health & Allied Workers Union on behalf of Sinxo & others and Agricultural Research Council is important primarily for two reasons. Firstly, it deals with when an employee can claim that he or she has been discriminated against on an arbitrary ground as envisaged in section 6(1) of the Employment Equity Act, 1998 (the “EEA”) ...
