The law on civil partnerships, north and south of the border, is set to change, writes Jennifer Liddell. This year, in response to a Supreme Court ruling, Parliament passed the Civil Partnerships, Marriages and Deaths (Registration etc) Act 2019. Section 2 of that act requires the Secretary of State
Search: Scots syndicate 1901 bought land in Glasgow for £5000
A landlord who failed to pay a tenancy deposit into an approved deposit scheme until four years into the tenancy has been unsuccessful in challenging a payment order. Linda Searle appealed against a decision of the First-tier Tribunal for Scotland Housing and Property Chamber (FtT) in which she
A judge has questioned why the courts require facts to be "squeezed into a Moorov straitjacket" instead of recognising a more general principle admitting similar fact evidence where relevance is established. Lord Glennie made the obiter comments in a judgment allowing the appeal against conviction o
The Prime Minister’s advice to HM The Queen that parliamentary business at Westminster should be suspended for five weeks in the run up to “Brexit” undermined a “central pillar” of the constitution that the Government was accountable to Parliament. The Inner House
Scotland’s oldest university will be able to pursue legal action in this jurisdiction against a company it has accused of infringing its trade marks in the sale of student gowns after a Court of Session judge rejected arguments by the London-based retailer that the case should be hea
The three-month time limit for raising judicial review proceedings begins on the date when the decision under challenge is made and not when the party seeking to bring the action is notified of the decision. A judge in the Court of Session ruled that the time limit under section 27A of the
Property law can seem boring and unimportant to some people at times. In the face of a crisis, property law often seems decidedly unimportant. People need to live somewhere, though, and opportunistic and/or thoughtless landlords might use a situation of crisis (or be completely or wilfully oblivious
Robert Pirrie WS, chief executive of the WS Society, tells the story of William Roughead, the Edinburgh lawyer who became the father of the ‘true crime’ genre and the celebrated trial for murder of Miss Madelaine Smith. Amongst the many remarkable collections of the Signet Library,
A new Electronic Communications Code judgment is another wolf placed among the yearling sheep as far as mobile phone operators are concerned, writes Michael Upton. The Digital Economy Act 2017 amended the Communications Act 2003, so that from the end of 2017 the new Electronic Communications Code re
Headhunters are calling on Scotland's legal sector to avoid repeating poor HR decisions made during the financial crisis in order to survive and thrive in a post-COVID-19 economy. In its eighth and latest annual salary guide, written prior to the pandemic, Core-Asset Consulting were already hig
In 1884, a lamb skipped its way into Scottish legal history after it entered unfriendly territory. Winans v Macrae [1885] 22 SLR 692 is a leading case on the issue of trespass by animals and affirmed the requirement for actual material damage for a successful interdict claim.
The defender in a personal injury case who sought decree that a settlement offer by the pursuer could not be withdrawn impliedly even in a change of material circumstances has had its motion refused by the All-Scotland Sheriff Personal Injury Court in Edinburgh. The pursuer, Maxwell D
Graeme MacLeod comments on a recent Inner House judgment in which police officers in a WhatsApp group lost an appeal against a decision to investigate them. The case of BC v the Chief Constable of the Police Service of Scotland was pursued by a group of 10 Scottish police officers, all of whom were
A sex offender who was convicted of indecently assaulting his cousin, who died before the beginning of the trial diet, has had his appeal against the conviction on the grounds that the trial was unfair refused. The appellant, AS, was also convicted of the indecent assault, attempted rape, and r
Chris Holme looks at the life of Henry Dundas, a controversial figure who has come under scrutiny this year in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement. He’s the man I walk past every day but never get to see up close. That’s because he’s 140 feet up in St Andrew Square –