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This Practice Note outlines the law concerning criminal recklessness. The subjective test for recklessness Certain statutory and common law offences allow the prosecution to prove mens rea through ‘recklessness’. Put simply, recklessness is where the accused takes an unjustified risk that results in unlawful harm or damage. The House of Lords in R v G reaffirmed the subjective approach to recklessness. Before R v G, two distinct tests were used, depending on the offence charged: Subjective recklessness from R v Cunningham: the prosecution had to establish that the accused personally foresaw the risk. Objective recklessness from R v Caldwell: the prosecution only needed to show that the risk would have been obvious to a reasonable person, without proving the accused themselves foresaw it. In R v G, the House of Lords concluded that the objective test could operate unfairly where a defendant did not foresee the
This Practice Note examines the remedy of rescission, explaining when and in what manner a contract can be unwound (at common law, in equity and under statute) and thereby terminated and brought to an end. It covers the consequences and effects of rescission, the principal grounds for setting aside an agreement (misrepresentation, mistake, undue influence, duress, non‑disclosure, fiduciary misdealing and bribery) and the main obstacles to claiming rescission—affirmation, the intervention of third‑party rights and the impossibility of restitution. For further guidance on rescission in the context of misrepresentation, see Practice Note: Misrepresentation—rescission as a remedy. There are many ways in which a contract may reach its end; see: Terminating contracts—how and when a contract ends—overview for a brief and accessible summary, with links to the related further practical guidance, including Practice Note: Termination and expiry of contracts. For a table
What is a res judicata? A res judicata is a determination by a court or tribunal with jurisdiction over the cause of action and the parties, which finally disposes of the issues decided so they cannot be litigated again by those bound, save on appeal. Final judgments entered by default or by consent fall within this concept, whereas rulings on purely procedural points and any decision lacking finality do not. The doctrine’s aim is to bring litigation to an end and shield parties from being harassed by the same dispute twice. in personam—binds the parties and their privies in rem—binds all persons, privy or otherwise (ie a judgment binding the whole world) A party may rely on res judicata: as an estoppel to defeat an opponent’s claim or defence; and/or as the basis of their own claim or
The offence of causing grievous bodily harm with intent Wounding or causing grievous bodily harm (GBH) with intent can be tried solely in the Crown Court on indictment. Elements of the offence Under the Offences against the Person Act 1861 (OATPA 1861), the prosecution must establish that the defendant unlawfully and maliciously: wounded with the intention of causing GBH, or caused GBH with that intention, or wounded intending to resist or prevent the lawful arrest or detention of any person, or caused GBH intending to resist or prevent the lawful arrest or detention of any person ‘Unlawfully’ and ‘maliciously’ Unlawfully The wounding or causing of GBH must be unlawful. Such conduct may be lawful if used: in self-defence in defence of another in defence of property for the prevention of crime where the victim gave express or implied consent For further information on these defences, see below:
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Through the Human Rights Act 1998 ( HRA 1998), the rights set out in the European Convention on Human Rights ( ECHR) are given domestic effect in English law. A claimant may, therefore, pursue legal proceedings under the HRA 1998 against a public authority for an alleged breach of their Convention rights safeguarded by the ECHR. There are various situations in which the common law affords no remedy, yet a claim under the HRA 1998 might be available, or the HRA 1998 may enhance the remedies open to a claimant. See generally Practice Note: Personal injury claims under the Human Rights Act 1998. Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life) Article 8 of the ECHR is among the Convention’s most influential provisions, and the right to respect for private life has broad scope across multiple contexts, particularly concerning medical...
Statutory framework At present, four principal pension schemes operate in England and Wales for members of the armed forces. These are: Armed Forces Pension Scheme 1975 ( AFPS 1975) — formerly open only to the regular forces; closed to new members from 6 April 2006 and stopped future accrual from 1 April 2022 Armed Forces Pension Scheme 2005 ( AFPS 2005) — likewise for the regular forces only; also closed to future accrual from 1 April 2022 Reserve Forces Pension Scheme 2005 ( RFPS 2005) — open to full time reservists; again closed to future accrual from 1 April 2022 Armed Forces Pension Scheme 2015 ( AFPS 2015) — open to the regular forces and all reservists; effective from 1 April 2015 There are also several other schemes, run by the same manager, that provide pension or other...
ARCHIVED: This Practice Note is archived and is no longer maintained. The Investigatory Powers Act 2016 ( IPA 2016) forms the principal statutory scheme regulating the use of covert surveillance undertaken by public bodies. Rules on obtaining and disclosing communications data sit in IPA 2016, Parts 2 and 3, which replaced the RIPA 2000 provisions on interception and communications data acquisition. For guidance on acquiring and using communications data under IPA 2016, refer to the Practice Notes ' Acquisition, retention and disclosure of communications data under the Investigatory Powers Act 2016' and ' Interception of communications under the Investigatory Powers Act 2016'. For an overview of the scope of IPA 2016 more generally, see the Practice Note ' The regulation of intelligence gathering—an introductory guide'. Communications data The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 ( RIPA 2000) established a detailed scheme for...
ARCHIVED: This Practice Note has been archived and is no longer being maintained at present. For guidance on the scrutiny of intelligence gathering, see Practice Note: Scrutiny of intelligence gathering and the role of commissioners under the Investigatory Powers Act 2016. The Investigatory Powers Act 2016 ( IPA 2016) obtained Royal Assent on 29 November 2016 and reshaped the legal framework regulating the use of covert surveillance by public bodies, a framework that remains largely—though not solely—contained in the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 ( RIPA 2000). For a comprehensive background to the introduction of IPA 2016, together with a summary of its core provisions, refer to Practice Note: The regulation of intelligence gathering—an introductory guide. The IPA 2016, Pt 8 provisions dealing with the scrutiny of interception are in effect and apply at the present time. IPA 2016 also...
ARCHIVED: This Practice Note has been archived and is not maintained. This Practice Note records recent updates concerning certain high-profile UK infrastructure and energy projects. Crossrail (the Elizabeth line) Railway linking Reading/ Heathrow with Shenfield/ Abbey Wood via central London. 28 September 2022 — Elizabeth line Bond Street station to open on 24 October 2022. See: LNB News 28/09/2022 77 24 May 2022 — Elizabeth line opens. See: LNB News 24/05/2022 26 4 May 2022 — Tf L announces the Elizabeth line will open on 24 May 2022. See: LNB News 04/05/2022 60 24 August 2021 — Whitechapel Elizabeth line station handed over to Tf L. See: LNB News 24/08/2021 26 12 May 2021 — Trial running begins and Tottenham Court Road Elizabeth line station handed over to Tf L. See: LNB News 12/05/2021 106 5 March 2021 —...
ARCHIVED: This Practice Note has been archived and is not maintained. For collated Brexit news and guidance, see: Brexit collection. Public Law Brexit News Analysis 2019 Lexis®PSL Public Law has released News Analysis covering a range of matters arising from Brexit, outlined in the tables below. 2 August 2019 — Referendums ( Scotland) Bill—‘interesting, but not decisive’ The Scottish government introduced a Bill on 28 May 2019 establishing a legal framework for running referendums within the Scottish Parliament’s competence. Now progressing through the Scottish Parliament, the Bill applies to all referendums. The government nevertheless has a declared aim to hold another Scottish independence referendum before the next parliamentary session begins in 2021, and meanwhile hopes to see the Bill enacted by the end of this year. Professor Tom Mullen of the University of Glasgow examines the Bill and the...
ARCHIVED: This Practice Note is archived and is no longer maintained. It charted the progress of UK primary legislation introduced as part of the legislative preparations for the UK’s exit from the EU during the 2017–19 Parliament. Following the prorogation of the 2017–19 Parliament on 8 October 2019, the Brexit Bills moving through Parliament that had not yet secured Royal Assent fell, namely: Agriculture Bill Financial Services ( Implementation of Legislation) Bill [ HL] Fisheries Bill Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination ( EU Withdrawal) Bill Trade Bill For further reading, see: Brexit Bulletin—key Bills fall away on prorogation of Parliament, LNB News 09/10/2019 64......
ARCHIVED: This archived Practice Note provides information about the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill introduced to Parliament in March 2023. This bill did not obtain Royal Assent before Parliament was dissolved on 30 May 2024 and consequently dropped from the legislative agenda—see LNB News 29/05/2024 66 and News Analysis: General election announced for 4 July 2024. This Practice Note is supplied for context only and is not updated. For broader developments on data protection reform, see Practice Notes: The Data Protection Act 2018—timeline and UK e Privacy law reform—tracker. This Practice Note outlines principal elements of the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill as published on 6 December 2023 (the Bill), which would have amended: United Kingdom General Data Protection Regulation, Assimilated Regulation ( EU) 2016/679 ( UK GDPR) Data Protection Act 2018 ( DPA 2018) Privacy and...
ARCHIVED This Practice Note is archived and no longer maintained. It brings together key examples of Public Law material that deal with issues relevant to EU law. Brexit Brexit—overview Brexit highlights—overview Brexit collection Brexit FAQs Retained EU law Retained EU law and assimilated law Retained EU law—a practical guide Assimilated law and retained EU law—quick guide Retained EU law—flowchart [ Archived] Retained EU law—training materials [ Archived] Retained EU law—a guide......
ARCHIVED: This Practice Note has been retired and is not being updated For the latest Brexit News Analysis, please refer to: News Analysis— Brexit collection. For material released during the transition period, see: News Analysis—transition— Brexit collection [ Archived]. Lexis Nexis® has produced News Analysis on multiple topics addressing the effects of Brexit. Key highlights issued before the UK’s departure from the EU are outlined in the tables below. You can receive Brexit news updates and commentary by opting in to alerts. See Q& A: How do I sign up for Brexit alerts? Brexit News Analysis 2019 Q4 23/12/2019 — Advocate General indicates EU standard contractual clauses are valid ( Data Protection Commissioner v Facebook Ireland Limited, Maximillian Schrems). The Advocate General recommended that the Court of Justice should find that the EU standard contractual clauses ( SCCs)—one of the...
ARCHIVED : This Practice Note has been archived and is not maintained. It sits within a series of archived Practice Notes that collate and summarise notable historic case law rulings and principles concerning public procurement law. The bulk of the entries in this Practice Note are archived decisions, determined before the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 ( PCR 2015) came into force. For details of the latest case law developments, see: UK public procurement case tracker EU public procurement case tracker This Practice Note concentrates on cases linked to procurement procedure. The overarching aim of public procurement law is to open procurement to wider competition and to ensure that tenderers have an equal opportunity to obtain contracts tendered by public authorities. The guiding principles are equal treatment of tenderers and transparency in procedures, so that tenderers know what to expect from the procurement process and have a clear...
ARCHIVED: This Practice Note has been archived and is not maintained This archived Practice Note is no longer updated. It recorded the status of UK primary legislation brought forward to prepare for the UK’s exit from the EU during the 2019 Parliament. The Early Parliamentary General Election Act 2019 obtained Royal Assent on 31 October 2019, setting a poll for 12 December 2019. Procedural rules provide that Parliament is dissolved just after midnight 25 working days before polling day. Accordingly, Parliament was dissolved on 6 November 2019, a mere three weeks and two days after the Queen’s Speech in October 2019. At that moment, all parliamentary activity, including every Bill then in train, ceased. Owing to the dissolution of the 2019 Parliament, the following Brexit Bill, which had not yet secured Royal Assent, lapsed: European Union ( Withdrawal Agreement) Bill 2019 For further reading on the...
STOP PRESS: From 24 February 2025, the core provisions of the Procurement Act 2023 ( PA 2023) apply. Any procurement commenced on or after that date must follow PA 2023. Procedures started under the previous framework—the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 ( PCR 2015), the Utilities Contracts Regulations 2016, the Concession Regulations 2016, and the Defence and Security Public Contracts Regulations 2011—must continue to be run and administered under those regimes. See Practice Note: Introduction to the Procurement Act 2023— PA 2023. PCR 2015 as assimilated law: PCR 2015 are EU-derived domestic legislation and therefore constitute assimilated law under sections 2 and 6 of the European Union ( Withdrawal) Act 2018. For practical guidance on the status and interpretation of assimilated law, see Practice Note: Assimilated law. Broadly, two categories of consultants are engaged in public procurement: consultants with technical expertise in the subject matter (for...
STOP PRESS: From 24 February 2025, the core provisions of the Procurement Act 2023 ( PA 2023) have taken effect. Procurements launched on or after that date must follow PA 2023, while those started under earlier regimes (including the Public Contracts Regulations 2015, Utilities Contracts Regulations 2016, Concession Contracts Regulations 2016, and Defence and Security Public Contracts Regulations 2011) must continue to be run and managed under those rules. The Cabinet Office has also refreshed its standard contract suites, templates and guidance for the government’s Model Services Contract, Mid- Tier Contract and Short Form Contract. These revised materials were released to coincide with the PA 2023 ‘go-live’ on 24 February 2025. This Practice Note will be updated shortly to reflect these changes. In the interim, see News Analysis: Procurement Act 2023 ‘go live’—what happens next?, and Government model contracts updated for...
It is part leadership, part shaping the right environment, part setting an appropriate strategy and part ensuring each individual’s contribution has clear purpose and direction. In-house lawyers perform best when they feel empathy with their business and a genuine sense of belonging to the team. Put simply, you should aim to forge a purpose for your work that extends beyond the activity itself. Yet simply declaring purpose and commitment will not suffice. For this to take hold, action and shifts in behaviour are required as well. This note presents ideas to help in-house lawyers deliver their service with purpose; in other words, helping in-house lawyers to make their own contribution to their performance management. Many organisations approach performance management through the lens of proprietary frameworks, such as the ‘balanced scorecard’ and its variants. These blend targeted hard indicators with softer...
This Practice Note considers agreements to agree, explaining why a promise to settle particular contractual terms at a later date has traditionally been treated as unenforceable. It also examines those situations where courts have nevertheless upheld contracts as binding, despite an apparent lack of certainty over fundamental terms. Principle Traditionally, contracts that contain an agreement to agree future contractual terms have been viewed as too uncertain to enforce. Whether a binding contract exists is assessed by an objective test, namely: on the evidence, a reasonable person would conclude the parties were in agreement and intended to create legal relations (the parties’ own views are disregarded), and the contract is sufficiently certain to be enforceable. Agreement For a contract to be binding, its terms must be definite enough for the court to give them practical effect and, in particular, those terms must be enforceable without the need for any further...
In brief A public authority does not have to disclose information in response to a request made under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 ( FIA 2000) if: the estimated cost would exceed the appropriate limit the request is vexatious the request is repeated an exemption applies FIA 2000 provides 24 exemptions that allow an authority to withhold the information sought. These exemptions fall into two main types: absolute exemptions qualified exemptions, which are subject to a public interest test When handling a freedom of information request, even where an exemption is engaged, an authority must still meet its duty to offer advice and assistance so far as it is reasonable. Therefore, even if material is considered exempt, the authority should do more than issue a refusal notice and should also consider what assistance to provide to the...
This guide has been created to tackle the practicalities of leading. If you are stepping into a leadership post for the first time, you’ll find practical pointers to get you moving. If you already lead, expect some fresh perspectives to renew your thinking. The ideas collected here take a pragmatic stance on leadership and the development of leaders, concentrating on the real problems and opportunities people encounter in practice. Leadership in the hot seat Seasoned leaders often describe their remit as demanding and intricate, and view with scepticism those titles that promise five, seven or ten secrets of greatness. Many argue such lists oversimplify the job. If such formulas truly worked, we would see an abundance of outstanding leaders, yet we do not. This guide encourages you to reflect on the particular setting in which you operate and the style of leadership you may need to...
What is open data? Put simply, ‘open data’ describes information released to the public in an open, machine-readable form, on licence terms that let users access, reuse and exploit it on a royalty-free basis. There is no single, universally agreed definition of open data. One widely cited example is the Open Definition 2.1 from the Open Knowledge Foundation. That definition is detailed, specific and designed to foster the widest uptake. Key elements of the Open Definition are: Data should be supplied at no more than a reasonable, one-off reproduction cost. Data should be available without restrictions on use, and it must be possible to process it using at least one open source, free or ‘libre’ software tool. The accompanying licence must meet certain conditions. In broad terms, it must allow use for any purpose without limiting the field of use, and permit...
This Practice Note introduces disclosure under the Civil Procedure Rules, highlighting the principal CPR provisions that regulate disclosure under CPR 31. It clarifies what constitutes a document for CPR purposes and supplies practical guidance for conducting a disclosure exercise. Note: this Practice Note does not cover claims within the Business & Property Courts Disclosure Scheme. For further detail, see: Disclosure Scheme ( Business & Property Courts)—overview. For assistance determining which disclosure regime applies to your matter, see: Which disclosure rules apply to my claim—flowchart? This Practice Note should be read together with: Disclosure—overview Inspection—overview Privilege and without prejudice communications—overview At the pre-action stage, be aware that certain pre-action protocols impose disclosure duties before proceedings commence. For more information, see: Pre-action disclosure and Norwich Pharmacal—overview. CPR provisions governing the disclosure process The CPR and case law form the legal framework governing...
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When evaluating a general damages claim, the practitioner ought initially to refer to the Judicial College Guidelines (JCG)...
This Practice Note This Practice Note reviews mechanisms used in settling litigation. A Tomlin order consists of a consent order paired with a schedule. It operates to stay proceedings on terms that have been agreed. The provisions contained in the schedule may remain confidential. This Practice Note describes the scope of confidentiality attaching to the schedule and sets out how it differs from a standard consent order. Sample wording for a Tomlin order is included, alongside links to precedents, as well as guidance on court approval. It also addresses varying, setting aside and enforcing a Tomlin order, including the considerations the court will take into account when handling applications for each. Further guidance is provided on interpreting and applying the relevant provisions of the CPR; however, some courts and divisions impose very specific requirements for both drafting and approval, and for approaching the schedule and confidentiality issues. Accordingly, you must consider the particular rules and court guide provisions in the forum where your claim is proceeding when drawing up the Tomlin order...
Date [ date ] Parties [ name of Landlord ] [ of OR incorporated in England and Wales (company registration number [ number ]) with its registered office at ] [ address ] (Landlord) [ name of Tenant ] [ of OR incorporated in England and Wales (company registration number [ number ]) with its registered office at ] [ address ] (Tenant) [ [ name of Guarantor ] [ of OR incorporated in England and Wales (company registration number [ number ]) with its registered office at ] [ address ] (Guarantor) ] [ [ name of Mortgagee ] [ of OR incorporated in England and Wales (company registration number [ number ]) with its registered office at ] [ address ] (Mortgagee) ] Definitions Within this Deed, the terms below shall be interpreted as follows: [ Annual Rent • the annual sum reserved under the Lease; ] [ Insurance Rent • the Tenant’s share of the Landlord’s costs of insuring the Property (as set out in the Lease); ] Lease • the lease of the Property dated [ date ], entered into between (1) [ the Landlord OR [ name ...
I, [ name ], of [ address ], solemnly and sincerely state that: [ Matters to be verified, set out in numbered paragraphs ] I make this solemn statement in good conscience, believing it to be true, and pursuant to the provisions of the Statutory Declarations Act 1835. DECLARED at [ details ] this [ day ] day of [ month and year ] Before me ................................................................................ [ signature of the person before whom the declaration is made ] A [ commissioner for oaths OR [ solicitor OR [ insert other qualification ] ] authorised to administer oaths ]...
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