Legal News

Domestic Irish implementing legislation under DORA published On 17 January 2025, the European Union ( Digital Operational Resilience) Regulations 2025 were enacted, with their publication in Iris Oifigiúil following on 24 January 2025. These Regulations implement the Digital Operational Resilience Act ( DORA) in Ireland. Under DORA, Member States were obliged to issue national implementing measures by 17 January 2025... CBI publishes guide to submitting DORA major ICT-related incident and significant cyber threat reports on the CBI portal On 16 January 2025, the Central Bank of Ireland released guidance on submitting major ICT-related incident and significant cyber threat reports through the CBI portal under DORA. It advises that in-scope financial entities should use the major ICT-related incident reporting template and the significant cyber threat reporting template for the respective filings. The CBI also noted that these templates were designed by the European...

A recent judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union ( CJEU) ( Case C-416/23 Österreichische Datenschutzbehörde v FR) clarifies the bar for when submissions to a data protection supervisory authority qualify as manifestly excessive, a ruling also relevant to controllers assessing the scope of their obligations regarding data subject right requests. Background In April 2020, Austria’s supervisory authority (the DSB) declined to proceed with a complaint from the data subject ( FR), deeming it excessive. Over a 20‑month period, FR had filed 77 similar complaints against different controllers and had frequently called the DSB to make additional requests. Under Article 57(1)(e) GDPR, supervisory authorities must provide data subjects, on request, with information about their rights under the GDPR. Article 57(1)(f) requires those authorities to handle complaints submitted to them. Article 57(4) GDPR creates an exemption: where requests are manifestly unfounded or...

Consult Practice Note: Prohibited names—key cases. For a summary of prohibited names, see Prohibited names—overview...

What has ‘gone live’? From 24 February 2025, PA 2023 has gone live, so the core provisions of the new UK public procurement regime now govern covered procurements. This spans public contracts let by central government, local authorities, and other public sector bodies for goods, services, and works above the applicable financial thresholds. For background reading, see Practice Note: Introduction to the Procurement Act 2023— PA 2023. How did we get here? Implementation followed an extensive journey, beginning with consultations under the previous government on post‑ Brexit reforms intended to streamline rules and enhance transparency. After parliamentary scrutiny and engagement with stakeholders, PA 2023 received Royal Assent on 26 October 2023, with a phased transition promised so contracting authorities and suppliers could adapt. A go‑live first set for 28 October 2024 moved to 24 February 2025 to allow for implementing legislation, system updates, and a...

Stanuszek v Bunyan ( Listing officer) ( No 2) [2025] EWHC 255 ( Admin) What are the practical implications of this case? Described as the appellant’s second bout of litigation, Stanuszek No 2 affects legacy council tax liabilities accruing before 1 December 2023. The effect is that responsibility rests with tenants and occupiers of rooms identified as separate hereditaments, treated as self-contained dwellings liable under LGFA 1992, s 3. These disputes stem from a Valuation Office Agency approach, in place since 2015, of selectively splitting HMOs by assigning individual bedrooms to council tax bands—often as Band A flats—even where the rooms lack essential cooking or washing facilities. The VOA defended standalone entries by reference to the ‘ingredients’ of rateable occupation articulated in John Laing & Son Ltd v Assessment Committee for Kingswood Assessment Area [1949] 1 KB 344. In Stanuszek v Bunyan [2023] EWHC 3275 (...

US Bankruptcy Judge Sean H Lane At a hearing, Judge Sean H Lane said he intends to approve third‑party releases in Spirit’s Chapter 11 plan using an opt‑out structure, and will set out his rationale in a written opinion to be issued by the end of February 2025. In the interim, he will enter a confirmation order for Spirit’s reorganisation once the airline and the US Trustee’s Office settle wording that safeguards the bankruptcy watchdog’s ability to appeal. The parties plan to file a revised proposed order on the afternoon of 20 February 2025. That approval would allow Spirit to complete a restructuring under which US$795m of debt would be exchanged for equity. Nearly all voting creditors of Spirit have signalled support for the deal. He noted last week that, although the Chapter 11 plan was largely confirmable, he required additional time to weigh...

Wagstaff, 53, accepted that defence solicitors are uneasy about the process. Speaking to Law360 at the SFO’s offices overlooking Trafalgar Square, he said issues with the agency’s legacy software — which missed potentially relevant material the SFO was legally bound to disclose to defendants in court cases — have produced more smoke than fire. He added that the review’s findings so far are heartening and that the SFO has not, as yet, found anything that would call the safety of any conviction into question to date. The agency began the review — the latest disclosure setback — in 2024, after revealing it was fixing an encoding fault in its newer system, Open Text Axcelerate software. Behind closed doors, and at times in open forum, publicly, defence lawyers have wondered whether the agency has minimised the scale of the technical problems. Flaws in the former...

Poxon and another v Wejo Ltd (in administration) [2025] EWHC 135 ( Ch) What are the practical implications of this case? As noted by His Honour Judge Cawson KC at paragraph 7 of his judgment, the case raises what appears to be an open point: when the court is invited to set the basis of an office-holder’s remuneration by reference to the time properly spent by the office-holder and their staff on matters arising in the administration under IR 2016, SI 2016/1024, r 18.16(2)(b), should it also examine the quantum of the administrator’s fee estimate provided to creditors pursuant to IR 2016, SI 2016/1024, r 18.16(4)(a)? The judgment therefore addresses whether scrutiny of that estimate forms part of the exercise. In this case, the court concluded that the evidence placed before it by the joint administrators was inadequate. It was not...

Baker Hughes Saudi Arabia Company Ltd v Dynamic Industries, Incorporated & others Case 23-30827, US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit What are the practical implications of this case? Central to the dispute is whether choosing a set of arbitral rules in an arbitration clause should be read as selecting a forum when no venue is expressly named. The Second, Fourth, and Eleventh Circuits have concluded that picking rules signals forum selection, invoking the canon expressio unius est exclusio alterius, whereas the Ninth Circuit has, without deciding the point, questioned that premise. The Fifth Circuit, likewise, declined to resolve the matter and voiced comparable reservations. Consequently, the court suggested that a split among circuits may ultimately crystallise if a circuit court squarely determines that adopting arbitral rules does not amount to choosing a forum. Turning to the discontinued DIFC- LCIA regime, the court noted that...

Hymans Robertson LLP In a response dated 20 February 2025 to the FRC’s consultation on proposed updates to the UK Stewardship Code, Hymans Robertson LLP warned that the planned definition could be weakened. The FRC had stated in November 2024 that its refreshed, strengthened definition continues to stress the creation of long-term sustainable value for clients through effective stewardship. This definition sits within a broader suite of suggested amendments to the voluntary code, first set up in 2010 to boost transparency across investments. Chris O' Bryen, investment associate consultant at Hymans Robertson, stated the proposed change risks undermining the Stewardship Code. He argued that taking out the wording diminishes the definition by removing an explicit nod to the environmental and social impacts businesses may have, as well as the scope for asset owners to foster positive, real-world results via stewardship activity......

AKS (a protected party) v National Farmers Union Mutual Insurance Society Ltd) [2025] Lexis Citation 46 What are the practical implications of this case? At its simplest, the judgment underscores the stringent, precisely drafted CPR provisions that regulate settlements involving protected parties, together with the mandatory formalities required before any compromise will validly bind a protected party. This is a point to be borne in mind by solicitors acting for protected parties, litigation friends and Court of Protection deputies alike. The ruling is also pertinent to those representing protected parties under conditional fee agreements and, more broadly, to the courts’ developing approach to success fees. It directs practitioners to give close attention to the appraisal of risk, to articulate a clear justification supported by evidence for any assessed risk, and to consider, where appropriate, early notification and frank discussion of success fees with clients,...

In a brief oral judgment, Justice Peter Roth noted that, although a £200m settlement is 'plainly a very disappointing outcome' for a claim once valued at £14bn, much has changed since the proceedings started nearly a decade ago. ' Considering the position today, we have no doubt that a settlement of £200m on the proposed terms is just and reasonable overall,' Justice Roth said, speaking on behalf of the tribunal of three people......

Antitrust A fresh appeal has been filed before the General Court in Case T- 19/25, Teva Pharmaceutical Industries and Teva Pharmaceuticals Europe v Commission, challenging the Commission’s decision in Teva ( Copaxone) ( AT.40588) and requesting that the fine-imposing infringement ruling be annulled—see further, application A fresh appeal has been submitted before the General Court in Case T- 682/24, Red Bull and Others v Commission, brought against the Commission for failing to reimburse additional costs incurred due to the disproportionate prolongation of an inspection—see further, application NOTE— For all......

Etrak v Libya, 2025 US Dist LEXIS 19756 ( D. D. C. 2025), Case No 22-cv-864 ( JMC) What are the practical implications of this case? In a New York Convention confirmation action brought in a US court, a state cannot evade recognition or enforcement of an unfavourable arbitral award by relying on: (i) an adverse ruling from its own courts issued after the arbitration commenced—even if that court case was filed earlier—because res judicata does not bite; or (ii) the existence of parallel confirmation proceedings in other jurisdictions. Interpreting the Convention strictly, the court explained that a stay of enforcement is permissible only where an application to set aside or suspend the award is before a competent authority in the country of the seat or the law governing the award—here, Switzerland. Libya had previously submitted such a bid to the Swiss courts and lost, and...

Publication has been made in the Official Journal of the European Union of the Solvency II amending Directive and Insurance Recovery and Resolution Directive. Member States are required to transpose the Solvency II Directive changes into domestic legislation by the close of January 2027......

What is a comparable mark? The UK Intellectual Property Office automatically created equivalent UK trade marks for each and every registered EU trade mark back in January 2021, which are called ‘comparable marks’. These comparable rights stand alone as separate registrations and are governed by the usual UK laws. Current position In the UK, a trade mark registration can be revoked if it is not used for an uninterrupted period of five years, similar to the position in the EU. However, use of the mark within the EU before 1 January 2021 may count as use of the comparable UK mark. This has enabled comparable marks to be preserved, even where there has been no actual use in the UK......

Legal texts attached. Files included: OJ_ L_202500302_ EN_ TXT.pdf OJ_ L_202500301_ EN_ TXT.pdf Issuer: European Commission Document type: Legislation......

Hunt v IPS Law LLP and Others (transcript) [2024] EWHC 3395 ( Ch) What are the practical implications of this case? This judgment is a pointed reminder of the limits of AA 1996, s 9. That provision permits a party to an arbitration agreement, when sued in court on a matter agreed to be referred to arbitration, to seek a stay of the proceedings. In this dispute, however, the correct interpretation of the Investment Agreement meant the defendants were not parties to the arbitration clause at all, so a stay was unavailable. IPS Law, although described in the agreement as the ‘ Investment Escrow Party’, did not fall within the clause’s references to the ‘ Parties’. Nor could IPS Law invoke the clause via C( RTP) A 1999, because the Investment Agreement did not confer any benefit on it....

The EU AI Act adopts a layered regime for AI systems, imposing transparency duties on every model and reserving stricter risk‑management obligations for the most potent ‘systemic’ ones. These obligations are being hammered out through a code of practice intended as a key compliance tool for model providers. Yet that code could prove marginal if models are not correctly classified for systemic risk Under the Act, a model is chiefly deemed systemic when its training consumed more than 10^25 floating‑point operations. According to research institute Epoch AI, several flagship systems have already crossed this line, including: Open AI’s o1 Anthropic’s Claude 3.5 Sonnet Mistral AI’s Large 2 These are commonly viewed as ‘frontier’ models, pushing the limits of this disruptive technology. Nonetheless, recent developments increasingly call into question whether the volume of compute used in the pre‑training stage is the most...

On 10 February 2025, Trump jolted legal and corporate circles with an executive order freezing FCPA enforcement and instructing Attorney General Pam Bondi to reassess and reshape the federal statute’s application. He directed her to strip away ‘excessive barriers to American commerce abroad’ and to ‘prioritise American interests, American economic competitiveness with respect to other nations, and the efficient use of federal law enforcement resources’. Bondi has 180 days initially to implement the directive, with the option to prolong the review by a further 180 days if additional time is required. The order came on the heels of a Bondi memorandum telling prosecutors in the FCPA unit of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division fraud section to target foreign bribery that sustains cartels and transnational criminal organisations. To date, both directives have generated more uncertainty than clarity about what FCPA...