Latest News

The meaning of the word ‘house’ has been the subject of legal debate on many occasions. Many of the debates have had their origin in the Leasehold Reform Act 1967 , which gives leaseholders the right to buy the freeholds of their properties in...

Police have been given a new power to protect the public from unscrupulous wheel clampers. Under the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 , it is now a criminal offence to clamp or tow away a vehicle on private land without lawful authority. The ban will end...

There have been many cases over the years which deal with ‘family names’ in trade marks – ‘easyJet’ having brought some of the more memorable ones. Recently, US banking giant Citibank opposed a registration application by an...

A property owner whose Victorian townhouse was severely affected by subsidence has failed to convince the Court of Appeal that the local authority and a housing association (the respondents) should be held liable to compensate her for the damage. The...

Tenants wanting to acquire the freehold of their properties under the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 may now be permitted to make more than one application, following a recent ruling by the Court of Appeal . The case involved a...

The need for clear thinking about the ownership of bank and other accounts held in joint names was illustrated recently by a case concerning a dispute over an account following the death of one of the joint account holders. In 1997, Ernest and Mary...

The Data Protection Act 1998 is designed to protect the security of personal information, which is information that it is ‘reasonably likely’ could be used to identify individuals when matched with other data. The Act requires that data must...

When a supplier sought to protect its trade mark against a company that was breaching its right to control the first sale of its products in Europe, the claim was disputed on the ground that the trade mark owner had engaged in activity which had unlawfully...

When a geologist went missing in Angola in 1998 and was never heard from again, he was presumed to have been killed. Eventually, four years after his disappearance, his life assurance provider agreed to pay the £100,000 policy proceeds to his next of...

Construction disputes are common and the use of arbitration proceedings represents an attempt to make resolution of such disagreements easier. However, arguments about the legal right of the arbitrator to decide issues (‘jurisdiction’) are also...