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05 December 2025
Issue: 8142 / Categories: Features , Public , Judicial review , Human rights
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Public law update: December 2025

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The latest human rights & judicial review cases from the team at Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer
  • In human rights cases, courts are still grappling with the tension between fulfilling their constitutional role of ensuring accountability for executive interference with rights and respecting the judgment of the decision-maker.
  • The extent to which judicial review applies in a contractual context remains a difficult area, with inconsistency between recent case outcomes, showing the context-specific nature of such issues.
  • The courts continue to take a strict approach to delay in commencing judicial review proceedings, particularly in the planning and infrastructure context.

Interference with ECHR rights

In Shvidler v Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs [2025] UKSC 30, the Supreme Court dealt with combined appeals under the sanctions regime (where judicial review principles apply), raising issues under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). The focus was the correct approach of both first instance and appellate courts in determining whether interferences with ECHR rights are proportionate.

The Supreme Court confirmed

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Arc Pensions Law—Matthew Swynnerton

Arc Pensions Law—Matthew Swynnerton

Chair of the Association of Pension Lawyers joins as partner

Ampa Group—Kamal Chauhan

Ampa Group—Kamal Chauhan

Group names Shakespeare Martineau partner head of Sheffield office

Blake Morgan—four promotions

Blake Morgan—four promotions

Four legal directors promoted to partner across UK offices

NEWS

The abolition of assured shorthold tenancies and section 21 evictions marks the beginning of a ‘brave new world’ for England’s rental sector, writes Daniel Bacon of Seddons GSC

Stephen Gold’s latest Civil Way column rounds up a flurry of procedural and regulatory changes reshaping housing, alternative dispute resolution (ADR) and personal injury litigation
Patients are being systematically failed by an NHS complaints regime that is opaque, poorly enforced and often stacked against them, argues Charles Davey of The Barrister Group
A wealthy Russian divorce battle has produced a sharp warning about trying to challenge foreign nuptial agreements in the wrong English court. Writing in NLJ this week, Vanessa Friend and Robert Jackson of Hodge Jones & Allen examine Timokhin v Timokhina, where the High Court enforced Russian judgments arising from a prenuptial agreement despite arguments based on the landmark Radmacher decision
An obscure Victorian tort may be heading for an unexpected revival after a significant Privy Council ruling that could reshape liability for dangerous escapes, according to Richard Buckley, barrister and emeritus professor of law at the University of Reading
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