THIS ISSUE
Ian Gascoigne of LexisNexis dissects the uneasy balance between open justice and confidentiality in England’s civil courts, in this week's NLJ. From public hearings to super-injunctions, he identifies five tiers of privacy—from fully open proceedings to entirely secret ones—showing how a patchwork of exceptions has evolved without clear design
Could tortious liability be the only tool to make Big Tech pay for the psychological harms stemming from social media use? Harry Lambert issues a call to arms
Writing in NLJ this week, Nikki Edwards, president of the London Solicitors Litigation Association and partner at Howard Kennedy LLP, welcomes a landmark transparency initiative
Developers beware: cynical breach cases are on the rise, write Caroline Shea KC & Richard Miller
Firm strengthens international arbitration team with key London hire
Asylum seekers would be allowed ‘a single appeal’ at a new, independent appeals body staffed by adjudicators, in a substantial reform package on asylum
Property lawyers have urged landlords to act quickly if they are considering regaining possession of their properties, ahead of major reforms to the private rental sector
Contempt of court laws would be split into four distinct categories, under Law Commission recommendations to make them fit for the digital age
Australia-headquartered mining giant BHP has been held strictly liable as ‘polluters’ for the Fundão dam disaster in Brazil, in one of the largest group actions ever brought in the English courts
CILEX has applied for permission to appeal Mazur, the decision that legal executives and paralegals cannot conduct litigation even when supervised by a solicitor
MOVERS & SHAKERS
Harneys—Maggie Kwok & George Weston
Harneys senior leadership appointments
Freeths—Keith Browne & Jim Jordan
Freeths strengthens London Construction and Engineering practice with two strategic senior hires
Anthony Collins—Laura Moss
Anthony Collins announces strategic hire to deepen skills base in the social business sector
NEWS
More than 100 teams from the legal and financial services sectors competed in five sports at the 51st Law Society RFC Festival of Sport earlier this month
Part-time status need only be an effective cause of less favourable treatment, rather than the sole cause, the Supreme Court has held in Augustine v Data Cars
Britain’s new acknowledgement that Israel’s occupation is unlawful, and accompanying settlement-goods ban and sanctions, is significant but overdue, argue Danny Friedman KC and Victor Kattan in NLJ this week
New planning fee rises, wider trade union access rights and a service-by-email trap feature in Stephen Gold’s latest Civil Way
Existing defamation law can respond to AI ‘hallucinations’, but allocating responsibility will prove harder where outputs reach users without human intervention
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