Latest Cases

Employment – Employer – Duty of care – Reference. Sheriff Court: Rejecting a claim by a social worker employed by the defenders, a local authority, who applied for and was offered a job by another local authority—an offer that was subsequently withdrawn— that a reference the defenders gave to the other authority was not true, fair and accurate, the court held that the defenders were not in breach of their duty of care to the pursuer in giving the reference as it was legitimate for them to inform the new employer of their outstanding disciplinary investigation concerning the pursuer, and it was the fact of a Scottish Social Services Council investigation concerning her and not the terms of the reference that caused the loss of her new job. 

Action of multiplepoinding – Competing proprietorial claims to library. Sheriff Court: In an action of multiplepoinding in which the pursuer, a volunteer librarian, and the second defender, an unincorporated political association, advanced competing claims to ownership of a library, the court rejected the pursuer's claim to ownership based on the library's alleged abandonment by its former owner, an alleged voluntary transfer of ownership to her and the contention that she could rely on the doctrine of reputed ownership, and it also concluded that the second defender had failed to establish ownership, that the evidence led did not allow it to reach a definitive conclusion on the identity of the rightful owner, and that while the pursuer had failed to prove ownership, she had established a lesser right as depositary to exercise sole care, control and custody of the library. 

Solemn procedure – Sexual assault – Sheriff's charge – Concert. High Court of Justiciary: Refusing an appeal by an appellant who was 16 at the time and was convicted of a sexual assault on a young child by penetration following an incident in a dormitory at a Sea Cadets training camp in which another boy inserted his finger into the 12-year-old complainer's anus, the court rejected the contention that the sheriff had misdirected the jury when answering a question from them by focusing on causation rather than concert. 

Landlord and tenant – Commercial lease – Tenant's repairing obligations. Court of Session: Allowing a reclaiming motion in an action by landlords against the former tenants of a commercial building in which the landlords averred that at termination of the lease the subjects were not in good and substantial repair, the court held that the Lord Ordinary had erred in concluding both that the claim, so far as based on an obligation at termination to put the premises into a condition better than they were in at commencement, was not relevantly stated, and that the relevant clause of the lease did not preclude the defender from offering to prove that the claim should be quantified by reference to diminution in capital value rather than the cost of repair. 

Prisoner – Detention for public protection – Rehabilitation. Court of Session: In judicial review proceedings by a prisoner, the punishment part of whose sentence of life imprisonment expired in March 2005 and who complained he had not been given a reasonable opportunity to progress through the prison estate and demonstrate his safety for release, alleging failings by the Scottish Ministers (the second respondents to the petition) and a local authority (the first respondents), the court refused the petition as against the local authority, holding that the case against them was irrelevant as they did not owe any relevant duty to the petitioner under art 5 of European Convention on Human Rights. 

European Union – Customs and excise. In the course of proceedings between the taxpayer company and Greece concerning the refusal by the Director of the Athens Customs Office to refund the taxpayer the registration taxes paid by it following the import of passenger vehicles into Greek territory, the Court of Justice of the European Union gave a preliminary ruling, deciding, among other things, that art 1(3) of Directive (EC) 2008/118 should be interpreted as fulfilling the conditions for producing direct effect allowing individuals to rely on it before a national court in a dispute between them and a member state. 

Contempt of Court – Sentence. The Commercial Court imposed a sentence of 18 months' imprisonment on a defendant who had been found guilty of contempt of court for failing to comply with disclosure provisions in a freezing order. 

European Union – Equality of treatment of men and women. The Court of Justice of the European Union gave a preliminary ruling, deciding that art 18 of Directive (EC) 2006/54 should be interpreted as meaning that, in order for the loss and damage sustained as a result of discrimination on grounds of sex to be the subject of genuine and effective compensation or reparation in a way which was dissuasive and proportionate, that article required member states which chose the financial form of compensation to introduce in their national legal systems, in accordance with detailed arrangements which they determined, measures providing for payment to the person injured of compensation which covered in full the loss and damage sustained. 

European Union – Jurisdiction. The Court of Justice of the European Union gave a preliminary ruling, deciding that the first paragraph of art 22(1) of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 should be interpreted as meaning that an action for the termination of co-ownership in undivided shares of immovable property by way of sale, by an appointed agent, fell within the category of proceedings 'which have as their object rights in rem in immovable property' within the meaning of that provision. 

European Union – Freedom of establishment. The Court of Justice of the European Union gave a preliminary ruling concerning the interpretation of art 56 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. The request had been made in proceedings between X-Steuerberatungsgesellschaft (X) and the Hannover-Nord Tax Office; concerning the latter's refusal to accept X as the authorised representative of a company within the context of a turnover tax assessment procedure.