Later this year, the Supreme Court of the United States will address the enforceability of class action waivers in employment arbitration agreements in Ernst & Young LLP v. Morris ...
On 29 September 2021, the Hong Kong Legislative Council passed a bill to reform the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance (Cap. 486) (PDPO) by introducing a two-tier offence to criminalise doxxing acts, conferring new enforcement powers on the Hong Kong Privacy Commissioner to prosecute doxxing offences and issue cessation notices with extra-territorial effect to demand the removal of doxxing contents by both Hong Kong persons and non-Hong Kong service providers ...
On April 17, a bill was introduced in the United States House of Representatives seeking to create the Rent and Mortgage Cancellation Act of 2020. The primary feature of the bill is it would suspend all rent and mortgage payments due during the COVID-19 pandemic, beginning on April 1, 2020 and ending 30 days after the termination of the pandemic by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The tenants and mortgagees would have no responsibility to ever make those payments ...
While the COVID-19 pandemic has led to the adoption of certain piecemeal consumer protection policies and/or guidances by individual states and the federal government, there have yet to be any sweeping changes to existing federal consumer debt collection laws or regulations in the wake of the pandemic. There has been a push, though, for the enactment of comprehensive consumer protection provisions ...
This year’s amendment of the Waste Act is forcing changes in the scheduling of incinerator projects. Target load start-up tests must be postponed until after the integrated permit is issued. This may give rise to claims by contractors for prolonging the project completion period because of a change in the law. In Poland there are currently six communal waste incineration plants under construction with EU funding ...
Governor Inslee’s March 24, 2022 signing of House Bill 1329 marks the introduction of changes to the Open Public Meetings Act (OPMA), the focus of which concerns public meetings’ accessibility and participation in the same. While the majority of these changes take effect at the fast approaching date of June 9, 2022, the Governor’s signing immediately implemented others ...
Governor Inslee’s March 24, 2022 signing of House Bill 1329 marks the introduction of changes to the Open Public Meetings Act (OPMA), the focus of which concerns public meetings’ accessibility and participation in the same. While the majority of these changes take effect at the fast approaching date of June 9, 2022, the Governor’s signing immediately implemented others ...
On November 12, 2020, the Washington Supreme Court extended corporate attorney-client privilege protection to appropriate ex parte communications between defendant hospitals and their non-employee agents. The court’s decision in Hermanson v. MultiCare Health Sys., Inc ...
On November 5, 2020, the Washington Supreme Court altered a 60-year provision of Washington’s Minimum Wage Statute when it issued its decision in Martinez-Cuevas v. DeRuyter Brothers Dairy. The court held that the agricultural overtime exemption at RCW 49.46.130(2)(g), which exempted agricultural employers from paying overtime at a rate of 1.5 times the regularly hourly rate, violated article I, section 12 of the Washington State Constitution as applied to dairy workers ...
We previously provided an update regarding the enactment of a capital gains tax (the “Tax”) in the State of Washington (read about it here). In that article, we noted the Tax was subject to at least one lawsuit in Washington. That lawsuit resulted in the trial court striking down the Tax, which caused an appeal to the Washington State Supreme Court (the “Court”) ...
August 14, 2024 By: Wendy Lee A little more than a year ago, on July 23, 2023, the Washington My Health My Data Act (WMHMDA) was passed into law. The law originally went into effect on March 31, 2024, however the compliance deadline for small businesses was June 30, 2024. This law was passed as a reaction to the Dobbs v. Jackson Supreme Court ruling and was designed to protect consumer health data ...
April 2, 2024 By: Leah Lively and Alexandra Shulman On June 6, 2024, new amendments to Washington State’s noncompetition statute (RCW 49.62) will go into effect, which place further limitations on the use of noncompetition agreements in Washington. Substitute Senate Bill 5935 introduces several modifications to RCW 49.62 that Washington employers (and employers with Washington employees) should be aware of: Broader definition of “noncompetition covenant ...
People hoping Washington would closely follow Oregon into the regulated use of psilocybin overseen by licensed practitioners faced a delay when a committee of the Washington legislature converted Senate Bill 5263 from legalizing psilocybin services to calling for more research. On March 7, 2023, the state senate passed the substitute version of SB 5263 with 41 votes for passage and 7 opposed ...
Over the weekend, the Washington State Legislature passed a bill that would enact a tax on gains from the sale or exchange of certain capital assets ...
Over the weekend, the Washington State Legislature passed a bill that would enact a tax on gains from the sale or exchange of certain capital assets ...
There were a lot of good green measures in the Budget and the government deserves credit for recognising the vital role that net zero transition will play in determining our future prosperity. Not just building back stronger but building back greener, with reference clearly made to the role the headline announcement of Freeports will have in supporting the delivery of the UK’s clean energy revolution ...
You have the right to remain silent and to an attorney, and what you say can be used against you in a court of law. From Sergeant Joe Friday on “Dragnet” to Lennie Briscoe on “Law & Order,” millions of television viewers have been Mirandized by these all-too-familiar warnings such that they have become as much a part of police work as handcuffs and a badge ...
A summary of the decision in Allay (UK) Limited v S Gehlen and a reminder to employers to keep equal opportunities training up to date to be able to rely on the all reasonable steps defence under s 109 (4) of the Equality Act 2010. It is common for employers to provide employees with equal opportunities training, to underpin workplace culture as well as to prevent discrimination from taking place. A recent case, however, provides a salutary reminder to keep such training up to date ...
When bankers and First Amendment lawyers encounter each other at cocktail parties, they can struggle to find common interests. Here is something to break the ice. In July 2010, President Obama signed into law the Dodd-Frank Act, the most comprehensive series of financial regulatory reform measures since the Great Depression. Just one year later, the United States Supreme Court issued Sorrell v. IMS Health, Inc., 131 S. Ct ...
When crafting a liquidation or “pass-through” agreement for a subcontractor claim against the government, the key provision from the prime contractor’s perspective is a release from any liability for the subcontractor’s claim with the exception of amounts recovered from the government related to that claim ...
When crafting a liquidation or “pass-through” agreement for a subcontractor claim against the government, the key provision from the prime contractor’s perspective is a release from liability for the subcontractor’s claim with the exception of amounts recovered from the government related to that claim. If the release language is too broad, however, the agreement may provide the government a legal defense to the pass-through claim known as the Severin doctrine ...
In commercial contracts there is often a ‘waterfall’ clause, which provides for a dispute escalation process prior to the commencement of formal legal proceedings, leaving litigation as the last resort. Such clauses were determined to be legally binding in Cable & Wireless Plc v IBM United Kingdom Ltd [2002] EWHC 2059 (Comm) ...
On April 8, 2020, the federal government adopted draft wording presented by the Federal Minister of Justice and Consumer Protection for a draft bill to mitigate the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic in event contract law in order to protect organizers of recreational events and operators of recreational facilities from considerable outflows of liquidity ...
