Employment
The Ministry of Justice has published its long awaited review of the introduction of employment tribunal fees. This incorporates a consultation on proposals for reform of the existing remission scheme under which qualifying claimants can receive help with paying the fees required to bring a claim.
02 February 2017
Gambling
Advocate General Szpunar has today delivered his opinion on the questions referred by the English High Court in the judicial review brought by the Gibraltar Betting and Gaming Association (the "GBGA") against the extension of UK gambling duty to overseas operators.
19 January 2017
Trademark
Victoria Plum Limited v. Victorian Plumbing Limited [2016] EWHC 2911 (Ch)
This High Court ruling handed down by Justice Carr is one of very few English cases tackling the issue of trade mark infringement in the context of keyword advertising, as well as the coexistence of two parties with confusingly similar names...
19 January 2017
Gambling
TGP Europe and Fesuge, the operators of 12Bet, 138.com, Fun88 and TLC Bet, have entered into a voluntary settlement with the Gambling Commission for a number of failures arising from a Cheltenham Festival bonus offer. Over 5000 accounts were suspended by the operators following concerns relating to suspected bonus abuse. The Gambling Commission published a public statement on 11 January 2017, which encourages other operators to ensure the terms and conditions of bonus promotions are fair and easily understood by consumers, and to act quickly when evidence of consumer detriment is identified, especially in response to complaints.
16 January 2017
Data Protection
With the GDPR on the horizon, the EU is now overhauling and expanding the reach of the more specific privacy rules which relate to direct marketing, cookies and other forms of online monitoring. The ability of social media and messaging services to track users is one of many areas touched on in the European Commission's newly proposed ePrivacy Regulation, which was officially unveiled last week. We highlight some key impacts for the tech and media sectors, provided the proposed draft passes through the legislative process without dramatic changes. Businesses should incorporate these new requirements into their GDPR readiness planning.
16 January 2017
Gambling
On Saturday, the UK Government announced its proposals regarding reform of the horserace betting levy, providing broadly for a flat 10% levy on all operators on their gross win above £500,000. The Government is planning that the new regime will come into effect with considerable urgency, by April 2017 - that is when without these changes the next levy scheme would have commenced.
16 January 2017
Litigation
Two years ago, Olswang’s Litigation and Intellectual Property teams started The Injunctions Blog to monitor every significant judgment relating to injunctions.
16 January 2017
International Arbitration
Whilst the concept of the emergency arbitration has been around since the late 1990s, the use of emergency arbitration has come to the fore over the last six years as arbitral institutions around the world have adopted emergency procedures in their rules. Although the advent of emergency procedures was welcomed when they were first introduced, it appears from statistics provided by arbitration institutions that there has not been a large take-up in using emergency arbitration and that parties still prefer the bite of a court order when seeking emergency relief.
09 January 2017
Litigation
In this update, we consider the following developments: third party funders liable for indemnity costs; "Arkin cap" can take account of security for costs; costs of obtaining third party funding can be recoverable in arbitration; claimant ordered to disclose identity of third party funder so security could be sought against it; Olswang webinar: Third party funding: the future of litigation and international arbitration?
22 December 2016
Gambling advertising
The Advertising Standards Authority ("ASA") has published a ruling against Coral Interactive (Gibraltar) Ltd in respect of a Euro 2016 promotion which stated "FREE £5 BET. BET £10 ON A TOURNAMENT WINNER GET £5 EVERY TIME THEY WIN*" and had text which stated "AVAILABLE TO NEW & EXISTING CONNECT CUSTOMERS IN ANY CORAL SHOP." Small print linked by an asterisk beneath the advert stated "Available to multichannel Connect customers in any Coral shop."
09 December 2016
Gambling advertising
The Advertising Standards Authority ("ASA") has published a ruling against Betfred, in respect of a "welcome" email promotion, on the grounds that the promotion was misleading.
09 December 2016
International Arbitration
On 18 November 2016, the Court of Appeal of England of Wales issued its judgment in Excalibur Ventures LLC v Texas Keystone Inc [2016] EWCA Civ 1144, passing comment on the current scope of litigation funding and the role it plays in modern litigation.
08 December 2016
International Arbitration
The School of International Arbitration at The Queen Mary, University of London (“QMUL“) recently released its International Dispute Resolution Survey relating to Technology, Media and Telecoms ("TMT") disputes.
07 December 2016
As expected, HMRC has published its response to the consultation on the remote gaming duty (“RGD”) treatment of “freeplays”. You can find it here. It has also published draft legislation (as part of the draft Finance Bill 2017) imposing the new RGD charge on freeplays, which has been amended as a result of the consultation (the original consultation had included draft legislation). You can find the draft Finance Bill here (see section 48, which amends the relevant provisions of Finance Act 2014).
06 December 2016
Real Estate Finance
The well-known Certificate of title, produced by the City of London Law Society's Land Law committee (Committee), has recently been updated. While the 2016 Update is not a substantive overhaul, there have been some important changes especially in the reliance provisions.
24 November 2016
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