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03 October 2014
Issue: 7624 / Categories: Legal News , Insurance / reinsurance , Personal injury
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Too powerful?

Insurers in the motor insurance sector may be exerting an unconstitutional influence

The Department for Transport (DfT) “gives every appearance of being browbeaten by the powerful insurance lobby,” argues solicitor Nicholas Bevan, who campaigns for greater protection for road users, in this week’s NLJ.

Bevan cites legislation and Motor Insurers Bureau agreements that he claims are “peppered with serious Community law breaches” and asks whether the insurance industry, like bankers pre-2008, are “thought to be too powerful to confront”. Why, he asks, were DfT officials unable to explain in a recent case why they authored a clause in 1999 that breached Directives?

MOVERS & SHAKERS

Carey Olsen—Patrick Ormond

Carey Olsen—Patrick Ormond

Partner joinscorporate and finance practice in British Virgin Islands

Dawson Cornwell—Naomi Angell

Dawson Cornwell—Naomi Angell

Firm strengthens children department with adoption and surrogacy expert

Penningtons Manches Cooper—Graham Green

Penningtons Manches Cooper—Graham Green

Media and technology expert joins employment team as partner in Cambridge

NEWS
Freezing orders in divorce proceedings can unexpectedly ensnare third parties and disrupt businesses. In NLJ this week, Lucy James of Trowers & Hamlins explains how these orders—dubbed a ‘nuclear weapon’—preserve assets but can extend far beyond spouses to companies and business partners 
A Court of Appeal ruling has clarified that ‘rent’ must be monetary—excluding tenants paid in labour from statutory protection. In this week's NLJ, James Naylor explains Garraway v Phillips, where a tenant worked two days a week instead of paying rent
Thousands more magistrates are to be recruited, under a major shake-up to speed up and expand the hiring process
Three men wrongly imprisoned for a combined 77 years have been released—yet received ‘not a penny’ in compensation, exposing deep flaws in the justice system. Writing in NLJ this week, Dr Jon Robins reports on Justin Plummer, Oliver Campbell and Peter Sullivan, whose convictions collapsed amid discredited forensics, ‘oppressive’ police interviews and unreliable ‘cell confessions’
A quiet month for employment cases still delivers key legal clarifications. In his latest Employment Law Brief for NLJ, Ian Smith reports that whistleblowing protection remains intact even where disclosures are partly self-serving, provided the worker reasonably believes they serve the ‘public interest’ 
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