The re-introduction of Crown preference and the resulting change in the order of priority of creditors on insolvency was announced as part of the Autumn budget in 2018, way before anyone had heard of Covid-19, and was originally due to come into force on 6 April 2020. It was delayed until 1 December
Search: Scottish syndicate purchased land 1901 for £5000
Daniel Wincott, Blackwell professor of law and society at the University of Cardiff, explores the impact of Brexit on devolution across the UK. Brexit has exposed the underdeveloped and fragile aspects of devolution in the UK. Devolved governments’ relationships with London are strained. The a
MSPs have called for public bodies to be compelled to publish employee ethnicity pay data to address “institutional racism” and tackle the “unacceptable” levels of unemployment and in-work poverty among minority ethnic communities in Scotland. Holyrood’s Equalitie
The High Court in London recently heard an application which had as its aim the exclusion of evidence obtained in the course of law enforcement activity into the EncroChat platform. For reasons which this article will hopefully make obvious, that application will in time be remembered as simply the
Scotland is becoming a state in which the population is forced to conform to the vision and values of the ruling elite, a new book argues. In The Justice Factory: Can the Rule of Law Survive in 21st Century Scotland?, author Ian Mitchell suggests that the country is on the road to becoming an author
The claim that juries subscribe to rape myths and are biased against complainants has no basis in empirical fact, a new study has found. The work, undertaken by academics at University College London, is also informed by research that casts serious doubt on the value of mock juries as a proxy for re
Gordon Lindhurst examines a recent US judgment on religious meetings during the pandemic, finding that it parallels European cases. In granting injunctive relief against fixed limits on the number of attendees allowed at religious services due to Covid, the US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) in Roman Ca
Baktosch Gillan spoke to Rosalind McInnes, BBC Scotland legal director, about her career with the broadcaster and coping with lockdown. In more than two decades as an in-house solicitor with BBC Scotland, Rosalind McInnes has been a source of advice and support to not only the journalists employed a
Andrew Stevenson reflects on a literary-cum-legal encounter between two of Scotland's greatest writers. Two hundred years ago two of Scotland’s most eminent men of literature met in court. One of them, James Hogg, the self-styled Ettrick Shepherd, is best known for his novel The Private
Eric McQueen, chief executive of the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service (SCTS), has written to bar associations in response to a letter raising concerns about the implementation of Covid-19 protections in court and tribunal buildings. We reproduce his letter in full below. Thank you for your lett
David Whitehouse, who is understood to have been awarded £10 million from the Crown Office in an out-of-court settlement and millions more from Police Scotland in addition to legal costs, has criticised the current Lord Advocate, James Wolffe QC, for an apology sent to him that fails to detail
Thomas Ross QC dissects the latest judgment in the fascinating EncroChat saga. In my last article on this topic I predicted widespread legal challenges to attempts by prosecutors to lead evidence obtained as part of the ‘Encro Hack’ – carried out by French police in May 2020. That
A judge in the Outer House of the Court of Session has rejected a defence pled by the Crown in response to an action for damages for wrongful and malicious prosecution brought by a man who was unsuccessfully prosecuted for fraud for his role in the acquisition of Rangers FC by Craig Whyte
A new advocate has spoken of the difficult position he and his cohort have found themselves in over the past year and has called on government to widen the ambit of financial support schemes. Jon Kiddie joined the Faculty of Advocates last year, along with 25 others in what was one of the biggest in
The High Court of Justiciary has refused six conjoined appeals against conviction by a group of men convicted of conspiring to murder a family in Glasgow. Brian Ferguson, Andrew Gallacher, Robert Pickett, Andrew Sinclair, John Hardie, and Peter Bain were sente