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06 June 2019 / Roderick Ramage
Issue: 7843 / Categories: Features , Procedure & practice
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Law in 101 words

Snippets from The Reduced Law Dictionary, by Roderick Ramage

Amendment colours

The Civil Procedure Rules Practice Direction 17 r2.4 directs that ‘The order of colours to be used for successive amendments is: (1) red, (2) green, (3) violet and (4) yellow’. The same order for successive amendments to non-contentious documents is followed by solicitors, who make amendments in longhand. By the time that one reaches yellow, the document is usually so incomprehensible that one must retype or rewrite it. Microsoft Word’s advanced track changes options offers all the colours you want, but not four users each with a separate colour. It is, however, improbable that Microsoft had ever heard of the CPR.

Bailiffs—guilty until proved innocent

A power to recover money by taking control and selling goods is exercisable only in accordance with the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007 sch12: s62. Para 10 says ‘an enforcement agent (aka bailiff) may take control of goods only if they are goods of the debtor’. According to the MoJ’s Taking Control of Goods (April 2014) para

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Michelman Robinson—Daniel Burbeary

Michelman Robinson—Daniel Burbeary

Firm names partner as London office managing partner

Bellevue Law—Sally Hall

Bellevue Law—Sally Hall

Employment boutique strengthens data protection and privacy offering with senior consultant hire

NLJ Career Profile: Ken Fowlie, Stowe Family Law

NLJ Career Profile: Ken Fowlie, Stowe Family Law

Ken Fowlie, chairman of Stowe Family Law, reflects on more than 30 years in legal services after ‘falling into law’

NEWS
Personal injury lawyers have welcomed a government U-turn on a ‘substantial prejudice’ defence that risked enabling defendants in child sexual abuse civil cases to have proceedings against them dropped
Children can claim for ‘lost years’ damages in personal injury cases, the Supreme Court has held in a landmark judgment
The cab-rank rule remains a bulwark of the rule of law, yet lawyers are increasingly judged by their clients’ causes. Writing in NLJ this week, Ian McDougall, president of the LexisNexis Rule of Law Foundation, warns that conflating representation with endorsement is a ‘clear and present danger’
Holiday lets may promise easy returns, but restrictive covenants can swiftly scupper plans. Writing in NLJ this week, Andrew Francis of Serle Court recounts how covenants limiting use to a ‘private dwelling house’ or ‘private residence’ have repeatedly defeated short-term letting schemes
Artificial intelligence (AI) is already embedded in the civil courts, but regulation lags behind practice. Writing in NLJ this week, Ben Roe of Baker McKenzie charts a landscape where AI assists with transcription, case management and document handling, yet raises acute concerns over evidence, advocacy and even judgment-writing
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