Latest Cases

Solicitor – Partnership. On termination of a solicitors' partnership, the claimant sought payment of around £150,000 which he claimed stood to his credit in his capital account. Although there was no written partnership agreement, the judge held that, on the documentary evidence, and preferring the claimant's evidence, the capital payment was due. The Court of Appeal, Civil Division, dismissed the defendant's appeal as there had been no abandonment by the claimant of his pleaded case and the judge had been entitled to say that the documents had 'strongly' supported his finding that an agreement for the payment had been reached between the parties. 

Value added tax – Appeal. The Upper Tribunal (Tax and Chancery Chamber) ruled on: (i) an appeal by Romsave (Property) Services Ltd against a decision by the First-tier Tribunal (Tax Chamber) to reject its applications to bring late appeals in relation to eight decisions of the Revenue and Customs Commissioners concerning liability to VAT and misdeclaration penalties; and (ii) the Revenue's cross-appeal in respect of the one case in which the FTT had allowed the late appeal to proceed. 

Employment – Discrimination. The claimant brought a claim before the employment tribunal (the tribunal) against the respondent nursery for indirect discrimination on the grounds of religious belief. She asserted that she had been discriminated against because of the dress code said to be imposed by the respondent which prevented her from wearing a full-length jilbab (a garment worn as part of her Muslim religious beliefs) and meant that she was unable to accept the respondent's offer of employment. The tribunal, in dismissing her claim, found that the requirement that garments did not go to the floor, thereby creating a possible trip hazard, was not a requirement or criterion which had placed Muslim women, or the claimant in particular, at a disadvantage and, in any event, it had been a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. The Employment Appeal, in dismissing the claimant's appeal, held, among other things, that the tribunal had not erred in its identification of the relevant provision, criterion or practice and had not made a perverse finding of fact. 

Divorce – Financial provision. The applicant wife applied, pursuant to r 33.3(2)(b) of the Family Procedure Rules 2010, for general enforcement of an order which required, inter alia, the first respondent husband to pay her a lump sum. She sought a third party debt order against sums frozen in a bank account held by the second respondent brother of the husband. The Family Division, in the circumstances, made a final third party debt order against the bank in respect of the sums held by it in or deriving from the account in question. 

European Union – Taxation. Kernkraftwerke Lippe-Ems GmbH (KLE) brought proceedings against the Principal Customs Office, Osnabruck, concerning a levy on nuclear fuel for which KLE was liable under German law in respect of the use by that company of fuel assemblies in the nuclear reactor of that power station. In the course of those proceedings, the Court of Justice of the European Union gave a preliminary ruling concerning the interpretation of arts 107 and 267 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), art 14(1)(a) of Council Directive (EC) 2003/96, art 1(1) and (2) of Council Directive (EC) 2008/118, and various other provisions of EU law. 

European Union – Customs and excise. The Court of Justice of the European Union gave a preliminary ruling, deciding that the Combined Nomenclature in Annex I to Council Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87, as amended, should be interpreted as meaning that a reading device for electronic books which had a translation or dictionary function should, where that function was not its principal function, that being a matter for the national court to ascertain, be classified under subheading 8543 70 90 and not under subheading 8543 70 10. 

European Union – Consumer protection. The Court of Justice of the European Union gave a preliminary ruling concerning the interpretation of arts 1(2)(a) and 5 of Directive (EC) 1999/44 (on certain aspects of the sale of consumer goods and associated guarantees). The request had been made in proceedings between Ms Faber and the Hazet Garage concerning a claim for compensation for the damage caused by the lack of conformity which had allegedly marred the vehicle that Ms Faber had purchased at that garage. 

Company – Petition. The petitioner, C, presented a petition seeking an order that the first two respondents, B and G, purchase his one third shareholding in the third respondent company. The Companies Court held that, on the evidence, the first and second respondent directors of the company were subject to equitable constraints, and that none of the allegations made about C's conduct had justified his exclusion while leaving him locked into the company. Relief would be granted to C under s 996 of the Companies Act 2006. 

Company – Insolvency. The proceedings concerned a company (the company) in creditors' voluntary liquidation. The applicant creditor of the company applied for an order, under r 4.70(2) of the Insolvency Rules 1986, SI 1986/1925, varying or setting aside the decision of the first respondent liquidator and chairman at a meeting of the company's creditors to admit the applicant as a creditor for voting purposes for a lower sum than the applicant contended should have been admitted, with the result that a resolution for the appointment of a joint administrator was defeated. The Companies Court, in allowing the application, held that S had erred in treating a liquidated claim (the moiety) as an unliquidated claim and in the application of the Rules. The moiety claim was a provable debt under the Rules and the applicant had, on the evidence, established its claim. It had not been open to the respondents to use a sum by way of set off against the moiety claim. 

Practice – Stay of proceedings. The applicants sought a variation of a recognition order insofar as it stayed the commencement of actions or proceedings against the first respondent company to permit them to pursue contractual claims against the company in arbitration proceedings. The Companies Court, in allowing the application, held that extant proceedings in the Republic of Korea did not prevent determination of the application and the claims had merit. In the context of substantive claims involving contracts governed by English law and agreeing to disputes being heard in arbitration in London, the order would be modified by lifting the stay preventing that arbitration.