Legal Updates

The Children and Families Act 2014 introduces fundamental changes to the way in which children in care will be dealt with. This Act seems to cover everything, from banning smoking in cars to how the most vulnerable children with special needs should be treated. This legislation represents one of the biggest shake-ups in childcare seen in decades.

One of the most important features of the Children and Families Act 2014 is expediting the adoption process, in terms of both attempting to make it easier to adopt children and reducing the length of time that care proceedings take through the court system, with a new maximum of 26 weeks.

Expediting the Adoption System

This month we are reviewing some of the recent changes to UK Courts that came into effect this year. We will start by considering changes to the Civil Courts and their procedure and finish our roundup with some changes to the Criminal Courts.

The Civil Procedure (Amendment) Rules 2014, together with the 69th update to the Civil Procedure Rules (CPR), came into force at the end of April 2014 and brought in several changes to Civil Litigation. Two of the main changes are the introduction of the single County Court and new civil judgment enforcement procedure.

Single County Court

Employment law changes are coming into effect. Now that it is June, ACAS early conciliation is in place and more is to come with regards to employment laws. The laws are changing as a way to help employees and employers; however, there has been some concern about the cost to employers. Find out what the updates are so that you can remain ahead of the game.

ACAS Conciliation

This month we are refreshing our knowledge of both land law and conveyancing procedure when considering the impact of solar panels being installed on a property when it is sold. In many parts of the country you cannot have failed to notice the thousands of properties that now have solar panels on their roofs. Much of this work has been done over the past couple of years, so it is still early on to fully assess the impact on the conveyancing process, but in this article we will highlight a few of the potential issues.

This month as we approach the 800th anniversary of the Magna Carta, we have the second in a series of articles on civil liberty and our justice system. We will start with an explanation of what the Magna Carta is and then consider a current example of the charter principles in effect, namely the changes to bailiff powers brought into force in April. 

The Magna Carta

Magna Carta is famous as a symbol of justice, fairness and human rights. For centuries it has inspired and encouraged the freedom movement and constitutional reform not only in this country but around the world. However, when it was issued by King John in June 1215, its future importance was not considered.

Does it seem to you as though the government is all over creating new laws for the insignificant aspects of life, yet they definitely procrastinate in legislating against the things that really matter? With so many people having voiced concerns over what are known as zero-hour employment contracts for such a long time now, how else can we justify such a deplorable lack of action in this regard?

If you work in family law as a Legal Secretary or PA, you will already be fully aware of the fact that this branch of the legal system has just experienced what many people are calling a revolution of change. New laws connected with family law have just come into force (April 2014), and for the most part, people are hopeful that they will mean some changes for the better in this area of law; however, others have concerns that the new laws could lead to a whole new set of problems.

The biggest change is the fact that the previous three-tier court system in family law has now been replaced by a single combined court. This is all primarily aimed at making this area of law more accessible and expeditious when it comes to dealing with around 270,000 such family law cases each and every year.

Are you getting a sense of déjà vu here? Haven’t we heard this promise somewhere before? Yes to both of these questions: indeed, the Conservative Party used this enticement in their manifesto for the General Election back in 2010. However, when push came to shove and they were prompted to deliver on such a promise, they said they were unable to go ahead with this tax break after all, as the Liberal Democrats were so vehemently opposed to this move.

If you are a regular follower of this Journal, you might recall that we covered the change to squatting laws that were due to come into force a couple of years ago. At that time, we discussed the fact that it was to become a criminal offence for a person to trespass and live without permission in a residential property and we speculated as to how the new squatting law would be policed once the Law came into effect on 1 September 2012.

Well now, nearly 18 months on, it is interesting to evaluate exactly how s.144 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 has been received and enforced.

This month we are focusing on local searches, which are one of the most important checks that a purchaser should carry out before signing a contract to buy property or land.

Local searches are usually provided by the local authority where the land or property is located. These searches form part of the standard conveyancing process and are obtained by completing a Local Land Charges search (LLC1 search) and Enquiries of a Local Authority (CON 29 search). The CON 29 form was last written about in a Journal article early last year. The parts of this form relating to drainage and water searches was to be used by most water and sewerage companies since 1 November 2013, and all providers in England will have to use the new forms and reports by spring 2014.