Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, sometimes nicknamed “Yuppie Flu”, has at last won legal recognition as a condition that warrants compensation in a ruling which will give hope to sufferers. A recent decision of the Appeal Court reinstated a December 1992 High Court ruling in which 53-year-old Ronald Page was awarded £162,153 for ME. Page claimed he had […]
In the opening pages of Nelson Mandela’s autobiography there is a credit to UK lawyer, Iqbal Meer, of Meer Care & Desai. Handling the South African president’s best seller Long Walk to Freedom has been a career highlight for Meer, whose life-long passion to defend human rights in his home country has been continually thwarted. […]
The fundamental problem with the Internet is the way it functions. Digital data can flow in seconds to anywhere in the world unaffected by laws framed by reference to territories and matter. Unfortunately, when it was established by academic and defence institutions in the 1960s, the protection of intellectual property rights and the regulation of […]
The Patents County Court in London is to run two alternative dispute resolution pilot schemes lasting for two years. Judge Peter Ford, who heads the court, intends to introduce the schemes this summer. They are aimed at providing a low-cost way of handling disputes about patent, design, copyright and other intellectual property matters. Judge Ford […]
The Law Lords are currently considering whether to hear appeals in the long running patent dispute between Chiron Corporation and others, and Organon Teknika, and Murex Diagnostics. The patent at the centre of the action concerns genetic engineering, recombinant DNA technology, the structure and behaviour of viruses in general and the hepatitis virus in particular. […]
The first meeting of the newly-formed Arab Lawyers Association will be chaired by Judge Eugene Cotran, who has agreed to become a patron of the association. The association aims to form a professional and social link between Arab lawyers who practise and study law in the UK, encouraging networking and the exchange of professional and […]
THE US lawyer who supplied documents crucial to UK compensation claims for asbestos-related diseases has received a Freedom of Information Award. Michael O’Connor, a vice-president and senior lawyer of the Chase Manhattan Bank in New York, was presented with his award by Labour leader Tony Blair last week. It was given in recognition of his […]
Director General of Fair Trading John Bridgeman has welcomed the Government’s Green Paper on competition law reform, saying legislation on cartels was the “most deficient part of the UK’s competition laws”. The consultation paper, Tackling cartels and the abuse of market power: implementing the Government’s policy for competition law reform, was issued by the Department […]
At least 14 of the top 500 US companies are reported to have lost the right to use their name on the Internet. And around 50 per cent of these companies have yet to register company names. Even the likes of Microsoft have been caught; a student in Utah operated an Internet site called “Windows95” […]
THE LEGAL Action group has appointed a former citizens advice bureau officer to its ranks. Vicki Chapman joins the legal pressure and educational group this month as its new policy officer, taking over from Anne Grosskurth who left for the Legal Aid Board last September. Chapman qualified as a solicitor in 1985, having taken her […]
The Lord Chancellor has announced a review of the civil appellate procedure to deal with the increasing number of outstanding civil appeals. A Lord Chancellor’s Department spokeswoman said measures put in place during the past year, which include a fixed time for oral arguments and more hurdles to clear for leave to appeal, had been […]
The timetable for the personal pensions mis-sale litigation, which started last summer, has recently been decided by the judge at the Bristol Mercantile Court. The case involved more than 100 plaintiffs who claim bad financial advice prompted them to buy personal pension schemes when allegedly superior occupational schemes were available. The action had been delayed […]