Legal Aid | Counsel

Competition and Markets Authority v Concordia International RX (UK) Ltd

Disclosure and inspection of documents – Public interest immunity. The Competition and Markets Authority (the CMA) was granted various warrants under s 28 of the Competition Act 1998, concerning an investigation into suspected anti-competitive behaviours in relation to a number of pharmaceutical drugs. The defendant (Concordia) applied to have the warrant granted in respect of it discharged to the extent that it applied to certain medicines. Prior to that application being heard, the Chancery Division considered whether Concordia could have sight of certain confidential material submitted in support of the CMA's application or whether non-disclosure could be justified, as the CMA submitted, on the ground of public interest immunity.

*ARB v IVF Hammersmith

Contract – Damages for breach. The appellant's appeal in respect of his claim for breach of contract against the respondent IVF clinic was dismissed. The clinic had implanted an embryo containing the appellant's gametes into his former partner (R), from whom the appellant had, by then, separated, without the appellant's consent (his signature having been forged). R had later given birth to a child. The Court of Appeal, Civil Division, ruled, among other things, that the legal policy which prevented recoverability of the cost of the upbringing of a healthy child tortious claims applied to the appellant's claim for breach of contract.

Glaxo Group Ltd and other companies v Vectura Ltd

Patent – Infringement. The Patents Court considered the validity of three patents relating to pharmaceutical compositions for inhalation. The defendant company (Ventura) alleged that the claimant companies (together, GSK) had infringed the patents by the manufacture and sale of dry powder inhalers containing ingredients used to treat asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. The court held that GSK had not established that any of the patents were obvious over any of the cited prior art. Further, Vectura had not proved that GSK's process and products had infringed the patents. Furthermore, the patents were all invalid on the grounds of insufficiency. GSK's process, and hence the products obtained as a direct result of that process, were obvious over the prior art.

University of Warwick v Balfour Beatty Group Ltd

Contract – Construction. The declaration sought by the claimant employer, that, on the proper construction of practical completion within an amended JCT 2011 design and build contract, it was possible to achieve completion of one section of the works prior to the completion of the whole of the works, was granted. The Technology and Construction Court held that the interpretation of practical completion contended for on behalf of the defendant contractor, and accepted by the adjudicator, had not accorded with the ordinary meaning of the words used.

WG v HG

Family proceedings – Orders in family proceedings. The total amount which the husband had to pay was £4.05m following the wife's application for financial provision. The Family Court based that on an initial lump sum in respect of housing and capitalised maintenance of £3.65m, with an additional £400,000, being a little bit less than half of the total sum due on her litigation loan.

Khosa v Secretary of State for Justice

Human rights – Prohibition on torture. The appellant's claim that the respondent Secretary of State had breached art 3, as he had been subjected to physical and mental torture over a period of time while in prison by those who had a duty of care to him, was entirely unparticularised. The Court of Appeal, Civil Division, in dismissing his appeal against the judge's refusal to reinstate that claim, further held that it was not appropriate to consider witness statements available but not provided to the judge.

B and another v Secretary of State for the Home Department

Passport – United Kingdom passport. The cancellation of each claimant's passport had been necessary and proportionate, and the defendant Secretary of State had not been legally obliged to give them advance notice of the basis on which she had been minded to cancel their passports. Accordingly, the Administrative Court dismissed the claimants' application for judicial review of the decision on the behalf of the defendant Secretary of State's to cancel each of their British passports.

Terry v BCS Corporate Acceptances Ltd and others

Practice – Pre-trial or post-judgment relief. There was no good reason why the defendant should not have adopted one of the well-established means of challenging a judgment allegedly obtained by fraud and his attempts to do so by other means, and to seek to do so without the need properly to plead and prove fraud, had been misconceived. Accordingly, the Court of Appeal, Civil Division, dismissed the defendant's appeal against the judge's order dismissing the defendant's applications, under CPR 3.4 and CPR 3.1(7), to strike out the claimants' claims after final judgment.

R (on the application of Safeer and others) v Secretary of State for the Home Department

Immigration – Tier 1 entrepreneur. The respondent Secretary of State's evidence that a Companies House current appointment report had not accompanied the first appellant's Tier 1 entrepreneur application would be accepted. The Court of Appeal, in dismissing the appellants' appeal against the judge's permission to apply for judicial review to challenge that decision, further held that the appellants' documents did not demonstrate that the first appellant had been continuously engaged in business activity.

Williams v Crown Prosecution Service

Public order – Offences. As a matter of law, the Crown Court had been entitled on its findings of fact to dismiss the appellant's appeal, thereby confirming his conviction by the magistrates for an offence contrary to s 5 of the Public Order Act 1986. Accordingly, the Administrative Court dismissed the appellant's appeal by way of case stated.

R (on the application of Begley) v Secretary of State for Justice

Prison – Release on licence. The National Probation Service's decision to set an exclusion zone that included the claimant's family home, where he wanted to move on his release from prison where he was serving a sentence for manslaughter on licence, had not been unlawful. The Administrative Court, in dismissing the claimant's application for judicial review, held that the interests of the claimant's wife and daughter had been given them due weight and the National Probation Service had been justified in finding them outweighed by the concerns of the victim's family.

Hein v Albert Holzkamm GmbH & Co. KG

European Union – Employment. Article 7(1) of Directive (EC) 2003/88 should be interpreted as precluding national legislation which, for the purpose of calculating remuneration for annual leave, allowed collective agreements to provide for account to be taken of reductions in earnings resulting from the fact that during the reference period there had been days when no work was actually performed owing to short-time working, with the consequence that the worker received, for the duration of the minimum period of annual leave to which he was entitled under art 7(1) of the directive, remuneration for annual leave that was lower than the normal remuneration which he received during periods of work. The Court of Justice of the European Union so held, among other things, in a preliminary ruling in proceedings concerning the calculation of remuneration for annual leave, namely the payment to which the employee was entitled in respect of his paid annual leave.

Re Sut

European Union – Police and judicial co-operation in criminal matters. Article 4(6) of Council Framework Decision 2002/584/JHA should be interpreted as meaning that, where a person who was the subject of a European arrest warrant (an EAW) issued for the purposes of enforcing a custodial sentence resided in the executing member state and had family, social and working ties in that member state, the executing judicial authority could, for reasons related to the social rehabilitation of that person, refuse to execute that warrant, despite the fact that the offence which provided the basis for that warrant was, under that national law of the executing member state, punishable by fine only, provided that, in accordance with its national law, that fact did not prevent the custodial sentence imposed on the person requested from actually being enforced in that member state, which was for the referring court to ascertain. The Court of Justice of the European Union so held in proceedings concerning the execution, in Belgium, of an EAW by the Romanian authorities against the defendant.

*Faraday Development Ltd v West Berkshire Council

Public procurement – Public contracts. By entering into a development agreement, the defendant local authority had effectively agreed to act unlawfully in the future, by committing itself to acting in breach of the legislative regime for procurement. The Court of Appeal, Civil Division, in allowing the claimant's appeal, held that that was, in itself, unlawful, whether as an actual or anticipatory breach of the requirements for lawful procurement under Directive (EC) 2004/18 and the Public Contracts Regulations 2006, SI 2006/5, or simply as public law illegality, or both.

*Welsh Ministers v PJ

Human rights – Right to liberty and security. The Mental Health Act 1983 did not give a responsible clinician the power to impose conditions which had the concrete effect of depriving a community patient of his liberty, within the meaning of art 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The Supreme Court so ruled in allowing an appeal by an appellant who had argued that the arrangements under a community treatment order amounted to an unlawful deprivation of his liberty and that he should, therefore, be discharged from it.

*UKI (Kingsway) Ltd v Westminster City Council

Rates – Rateable occupation. A completion notice had been served on the respondent company by the appellant local authority under Sch 4A to the Local Government Finance Act 1988, notwithstanding transmission via a person not authorised to accept service and being transmitted via email. The Supreme Court held that as long as there had been sufficient causal connection between the authority's actions and the receipt of the notice by the recipient, service had been effected for the purpose of the statute.

Alibkhiet v Brent London Borough; Adam v City of Westminster

Local government – Housing. In two joined appeals, in which the local housing authorities owed the relevant applicants a full housing duty imposed by s 193 of the Housing Act 1996, the Court of Appeal, Civil Division, allowed the appeal of the local authority in the first appeal and dismissed the second applicant's appeal. In so doing, the court reiterated and applied various housing law principles in relation to allocation of resources and the giving of reasons on review.

*R (on the application of Monica) v Director of Public Prosecutions

Criminal law – Prosecution. There was no merit in the grounds and challenge to defendant Director of Public Prosecutions' confirmation of an earlier decision not to prosecute the interested party, a former undercover police officer, for the offences of rape, indecent assault, procurement of sexual intercourse and misconduct in public office. The Divisional Court, in dismissing the claimant's application for judicial review, rejected her contention that the defendant had erred as a matter of law in concluding that the interested party's deception had vitiated consent.

*Williams v Trustees of Swansea University Pension and Assurance Scheme and another

Pension – Pension scheme. The appellant's appeal against the decision of the Court of Appeal, Civil Division, in a pensions dispute failed. He claimed that the reduced figure of his pension, resulting from its calculation by reference to his part-time, rather than full-time salary, had constituted 'unfavourable' treatment because of his inability to work full time. The Supreme Court held that the appellant's formulation depended on an artificial separation between the method of calculation and the award to which it would have given rise. It was enough that the award had not been in any sense 'unfavourable', nor could it reasonably have been so regarded.

Kershaw and others v Connel Community Council and another

Local government – Community council – Personal injury action. Court of Session: In an action for damages for personal injury, brought by an individual who sustained a neck fracture after falling when descending a flight of steps and claimed a community council was jointly responsible for the poor condition of the steps, in which the issue was whether a community council could be sued for damages for personal injuries, the court held that community councils were hybrid bodies that could be sued in their own name.

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