Railway strikes in the UK have halted services throughout July and Augst 2022.
Sony, owners and creators of the gaming sensation PlayStation, have been hit with a lawsuit with a possible £5 billion pay out.
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The UK government has once again extended its trade sanctions with Russia.
The UK underwent a record-breaking heatwave in July with another hitting the country in August.
The UK has blocked a Chinese company from purchasing intellectual property from the University of Manchester using its powers under the National Security and Investment Act.
The FCA successfully followed up on their October announcement to ban cryptocurrency derivatives, taking effect on January 6th 2021. This has been justifiably criticised by the investing community, for a lack of factual ground and practical enforceability. It appears to be more of an attack on digital assets then a well-reasoned choice of regulation, hence, there should be concerns about the future of financial freedom.
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It has been confirmed that on 21st January, Pregnant Then Screwed (PTS), an organisation that campaigns on issues that impact working mothers and offers support to those facing maternity-based discrimination, will be taking Rishi Sunak, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, to the High Court for discriminating against women in the Self-Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS).
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China, which was starting to be seen as a rising capitalist power and the land of opportunity by its people, is now uncompromisingly at war with this notion. With its ever-increasing trade sanctions and restrictions on mass media, it comes as a shock that China has agreed a trade deal with Europe.
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During 2020, the USA found itself in the middle of a tax war with France. This was in response to Macron placing a “3% levy on all revenue earnt from digital services used in France.” Branded as the dreaded ‘tech tax’, this naturally had a huge impact on tech giants such as Facebook Inc, Amazon Inc and, of course, Google.
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Spain's biggest economic hurdle has been youth unemployment, at around 40%, for many years. Now it has become one of the hardest COVID hit nations within Continental Europe. The nations’ central bank has predicted a 15.1% contraction in the economy if there is a 2nd wave of lockdown restrictions.
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In July 2020, a Bosnian volunteer handed over more than “1,600 pages of media reports and personal testimonies to Austria’s parliament, documenting the brutality of Croatia’s border police against irregular migrants”. The Border Violence Monitoring Network has observed an “increase in violence against refugees on the Croatian side since spring 2017”. Yet most, if not all, reports of violence by Croatian police continue to go unchecked.
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Despite Norway’s green credentials, its wealth has mostly been accumulated from huge oil exports.[LE1] Norway’s Nature and Youth group along with Greenpeace Norway are challenging what they describe as ‘double standards’, in a lawsuit disputing government issued oil licenses.
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On 11 December 2020, the UK Supreme Court handed down a landmark ruling on the hugely anticipated Merricks v Mastercard case.[1] This has followed the £14bn collective action on behalf of 46.2 million consumers, brought against Mastercard concerning anti-competitive interchange fees.
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Throughout 2020, NHS workers worked tirelessly to save thousands of lives across the UK. While their efforts have been praised via social media channels and “clap for carers” last year, NHS workers are still being overlooked by the government after requests for a 15% pay rise have been ignored.
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The Law Society has again called for non-means tested legal aid to be made available to domestic abuse victims after government data revealed unprecedented high numbers of family court applications. Data from the Ministry of Justice last week showed an increase in the number of domestic violence remedy order applications between July and September this year.
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There has been an ‘urgent notification’ issued to the justice secretary addressing major concerns of the quality of care and leadership at a privately run youth prison near Rugby.
This notification could be considered emergency action, and these notices are rare, but the so-called “bleak regime” has raised widespread concern.
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Facebook is being sued in the US in a landmark lawsuit that could end up with the tech giant being stripped of its prized assets, Instagram and Facebook.[1] Regulators, who argue Facebook built its digital monopoly over the years by violating antitrust (competition) laws, are considering breaking up the company.
Though it was only 10 days ago that the first person in the United Kingdom had received the heavily anticipated Pfizer vaccine, said to be 90% effective against combating Covid-19, increasing whispers about a different variant or modified strain of Covid have been spreading through the South East of England, about as quickly as the new strain has too.
Recently, influential legal and commercial entities have joined the bid for the UK’s accession into the convention by writing to Charles Michel, president of the European Council. These include the law societies of England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland; City of London Corporation; British Retail Consortium; British Chamber of Commerce EU & Belgium; Which?; and the Chambers of Ireland.
The title, a famous Hollywood line from Top Gun, brings back wonderful high-speed memories of the Concorde. The legendary aircraft of old has been grounded and retired since 2003 after more than 30 years of record-breaking commercial flights. However, putting aside it’s breaking of the sound barrier, the Concorde’s wings were clipped for various reasons, and the major reasons being environmental.
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On Wednesday 9th December, Labour's Dame Diana Johnson introduced a Ten-Minute Rule on the ‘Sexual Exploitation Bill’. If introduced it would make paying for sex a criminal offence and decriminalises selling sex. This would create offences of enabling or profiting from someone else's sexual exploitation, among other things.
