Pre-emption meaning

1. Settlor Gather the following details about the settlor (or each settlor, where there is more than one): full name and courtesy title status date of birth address domicile nationality usual residence a schedule of assets and liabilities (for this purpose, a separate schedule is useful) 2. Name of the trust Confirm with the settlor what the trust should be named 3. ...

Checklist The Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation (OFSI), a part of HM Treasury, is responsible for communicating, implementing and enforcing financial sanctions in the UK. It also holds powers to grant licences that permit an activity or transaction which would otherwise be prohibited under the UK financial sanctions regime. OFSI may only issue licences connected to financial sanctions. If your application concerns a different sanction, such as trade or immigration, you must send it to the appropriate Department. See further Practice Note: Understanding the financial sanctions regime. This Checklist brings together the requirements for applying to OFSI for a financial sanctions licence, alongside recommendations to help make your application faster and easier. These are drawn from multiple sources, including the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018 (SAMLA 2018) and regulations made under it, various OFSI guidance materials, and guidance from the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA). This Checklist also signposts relevant content to support compliance with these requirements and suggestions. A section is provided for you to indicate completion...

This Checklist reviews the entitlement to suspend under the Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996 (HGCRA 1996), and the matters that ought to be carefully considered before any party opts to suspend carrying out its obligations and duties under a construction contract. Is there a general common law right to suspend a contract? No. At common law, a party to a contract has no general right to pause or withhold ongoing performance of contractual duties when the other party is in breach, unless the breach is sufficiently serious to constitute a ‘repudiatory breach’, thereby permitting the innocent party to rescind or bring the contract to an end (see Practice Notes: Termination of a construction contract—Common law termination and Repudiation of contract). How does the right to suspend arise in a construction contract?...

This flowchart takes you through the stages of a CIETAC arbitration under the CIETAC Arbitration Rules 2024 Although each arbitration differs and the tribunal will tailor proceedings to specifics of the case, it remains vital to appreciate how an arbitration will 'usually' progress, together with the timescales likely to apply...

Stage 1—preparing to bring a claim and pre-action matters Guidance on infringement, defences, ownership, injunctions, running disputes, and the Business and Property Courts Disclosure Scheme; cease and desist precedent; timetable checklist; key forms; IP insurance. Stage 2—letter of claim alleging copyright infringement Guidance on infringement, drafting letters of claim, unjustified threats and remedies, with precedents for standard and peer‑to‑peer infringement letters. Stage 3—commencing proceedings Notes on infringement, secondary infringement, permitted acts, remedies, criminal offences, the Business and Property Courts and the Disclosure Scheme; pleadings/initial disclosure precedents; Disclosure/IPEC flow tools; CPR claim/defence/settlement/default forms. Stage 4—case management Guidance on running disputes, costs management and the Disclosure Scheme; checklist; Chancery, Patents Court and IPEC Guides; Mitchell v NGN; core case‑management and disclosure forms. Stage 5—disclosure and evidence Notes on e‑disclosure, witness statements and the Disclosure Scheme; PD 57AC for Business and Property Courts trial statements (not...

As of 12 January 2023, the EU’s Regulation on foreign subsidies distorting the internal market (FSR) took effect...

Antitrust Court of Justice dismisses appeal relating to the calculation of the fine in the pre-stressing cartel case The Court of Justice has delivered its ruling in Case C-70/23, Westfälische Drahtindustrie and Others v Commission, on an appeal brought against the General Court’s judgment in Case T-275/20. That judgment had rejected an action seeking annulment of the Commission’s decision of 30 June 2010, as later amended on 30 September 2010, in the pre-steel cartel matter (AT.38344) (the Commission’s 2010 decision). In 2010, the Commission imposed fines on Westfälische Drahtindustrie GmbH (WDI) and Westfälische Drahtindustrie Verwaltungsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG (WDV), holding WDI jointly and severally liable with WDV and Pampus, for their participation in a cartel covering the supply of pre-stressing steel. On 15 July 2015, the General Court dismissed an appeal against the Commission’s 2010 decision (the General Court’s 2015 judgment). While it considered that the Commission had erred in its assessment of arguments on ability to pay, the General Court, exercising its unlimited jurisdiction, concluded...

State aid General Court dismisses action relating to Commission’s decision approving compensation to Česká pošta for universal service obligations The General Court delivered its ruling in Case T-784/22, Zásilkovna v Commission, a challenge to the Commission’s decision of 25 July 2022, which concluded that compensation granted to Česká pošta by the Czech Republic for carrying out the universal postal service obligation for the years 2018-2022 was compatible with the internal market (SA.55208). The General Court rejected the action in full. By its ruling, the Court endorsed the Commission’s approval of the compensation measure. Background Česká pošta, the incumbent postal operator in the Czech Republic, has been designated as the country’s universal postal service provider. Under the universal service obligation (USO), Česká pošta is required, amongst other duties, to make available specified letter and parcel delivery services on each business day throughout the whole territory of the Czech Republic. The General Court upheld this decision on appeal. In January 2018, the Czech authorities pre-notified compensation intended for Česká...

In this issue: Key DR developments Cross-border disputes Pre-action and limitation Litigation Case management Evidence and disclosure ADR Scottish Dispute Resolution Dates for your diary Useful information Daily and weekly news alerts Key DR developments Guidance and reports Courts and Tribunals Judiciary publishes February 2026 updated edition of the Equal Treatment Bench Book: The Courts and Tribunals Judiciary has issued an interim February 2026 update to the Equal Treatment Bench Book. For more information, see: Courts and Tribunals Judiciary publishes February 2026 updated edition Equal Treatment Bench Book—LNB News 26/02/2026 28. HCCH publishes 2025 annual report highlighting private international law developments The Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH) has released its 2025 annual report, noting the creation of two new Experts’ Groups to examine private international law topics linked to Digital Tokens and Carbon Markets. For more information, see: HCCH publishes 2025 annual report highlighting private international law...

This Practice Note clearly explains the courts’ function within the context of family arbitration. In matters concerning families, any arbitration normally proceeds under the Institute of Family Law Arbitrators (IFLA) scheme. The courts continue to have overall jurisdiction over any family arbitration award or determination and will endorse the award or determination provided it falls within recognised limits, thereby fully respecting the parties’ autonomy. For further practical guidance on, among other things, the conduct of arbitration in family cases, the principal advantages of arbitration, the scope of the IFLA scheme and the arbitrator’s powers, please see Practice Note: Family arbitration—introduction. Acting on Law Commission proposals to reform the Arbitration Act 1996 (AA 1996) and to bring in measures to bolster arbitrator immunity, enhance overall case efficiency and clarify the court’s powers, a draft Bill reflecting those recommendations was formally laid before Parliament and subsequently obtained Royal Assent on 25 February 2025. Accordingly, the Arbitration Act 2025 (AA 2025) modifies AA 1996 from 1 August 2025 by virtue of the Arbitration...

Stop Press : From accounting periods starting on or after 1 January 2026, the Diverted Profits Tax is superseded by the unassessed transfer pricing profits rules. This Practice Note, alongside Transactions in UK land—tax rules, examines the anti-avoidance provisions aimed at countering attempts to sidestep tax on income, profits or gains connected with arrangements concerning, or trades of dealing in, land. The main anti-avoidance measure seeks to treat gains of a capital character realised on the disposal of land as income, bringing them within income tax or corporation tax. Further detail appears in Practice Note: Transactions in UK land—tax rules. From 5 July 2016 these rules superseded and expanded the former transactions in land rules (for information on prior rules, see Practice Note: Real estate—anti-avoidance: disposals of land and taxing capital gains as income (pre 5 July 2016) [Archived])...

The enterprise investment scheme (EIS) It is primarily intended to boost investment in smaller, higher‑risk trading companies by granting a range of tax reliefs to individual investors who acquire newly issued shares in such companies. The EIS rules are prescriptive and contain numerous conditions that must be satisfied, including those relating to: the individual investors the issued shares the issuing company This Practice Note centres on the conditions that apply to the individual investor. Those conditions are outlined in the context of the income tax relief afforded by Part 5 of the Income Tax Act 2007 (ITA 2007). References to the equivalent capital gains tax (CGT) provisions are included where appropriate. For information on the remaining conditions, see the following Practice Notes: EIS—conditions for relief: issued shares, the funds raised and the arrangements in general EIS—conditions for relief: issuing company EIS—conditions for relief: qualifying trades For a summary of tax reliefs available...

Precedent ICT (information and communication technology) risk assessment and risk management plan This Precedent ICT (information and communication technology) risk assessment and risk management plan lets you record risks linked to any proposed ICT development and explain how those risks will be handled. It is pre-populated with examples, which you can easily delete if needed...

FORTHCOMING CHANGE: The government has set out its proposals to apply inheritance tax to unspent pension pots on death, effective from 6 April 2027. For further details, please see News Analysis: HMRC confirms new IHT rules on unused pension funds to apply from 6 April 2027...

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Response to appeal Under the Employment Appeal Rules 1993 (EAT Rules), SI 1993/2854, rule 6(2) provides that a respondent who intends to oppose an appeal must lodge with the Appeal Tribunal a written answer in accordance with, or broadly following, Form 3 contained in the Schedule to these Rules, setting out the grounds on which they rely. Nevertheless, where the respondent seeks to rely on any ground that mirrors a ground adopted by the employment tribunal when making the judgment, decision, declaration or order under appeal, it is sufficient simply to say so in the answer, and it shall be sufficient to state that fact in response. For further details, see Practice Note: Responding to an appeal...

Section 38 agreements These agreements fall under section 38 of the Highways Act 1980; refer to Practice Note: Highways—adoption agreements. There is no statutory route by which agreements can be ended or ‘cancelled’. However, a section 38 agreement may, in principle, be altered by a deed of variation, but this requires consent of all parties to the original agreement...

A well-known problem amongst procurement professionals A widely recognised headache for procurement practitioners arises from the duty in regulation 53 of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 (PCR 2015), SI 2015/102 (PCR 2015, SI 2015/102, reg 53). It requires the ‘procurement documents’ to be accessible at the time a public contract is advertised in the Official Journal of the European Union (the Official Journal, or OJEU). In essence, contracting authorities must use the internet to provide unrestricted, complete and immediate access, at no cost, to those documents from the day a notice, issued under regulation 51, appears in the Official Journal, or from the day an invitation to confirm interest is dispatched. The issue most often raised, particularly for public procurements run under the restricted procedure (and comparable routes that involve a pre-qualification phase ahead of the award stage), is whether the invitation to tender and the specification must already be available when the contract notice is published in the OJEU. Timing this disclosure often proves challenging for contracting authorities...