2012 is shaping up to be another fascinating year in the legal world and the areas of family, employment, personal injury and conveyancing will all be affected by changes in 2012 but with announcements by the Prime Minister on an intention to “kill off the health and safety culture for good” it is likely to be health and safety which attracts most of the headlines. David Cameron says that he has asked the Health and Safety Executive to bring forward to the end of 2012 a timetable for removing regulations which are deemed to be unnecessary.
Commercial law -Health and safety laws
The government has said that it is committed to simplifying health and safety legislation for small businesses within the coming year and it is aiming to ensure that properly managed low-risk businesses no longer need to be visited by inspectors. It is also to form a new “challenge panel” which allows businesses to overturn immediately the decision of health and safety inspectors if they have got it wrong.
The moves are part of the government’s responses to the Lofstedt review, which published its findings late last year. It has, for the most part, accepted the findings and said that it will simplify health and safety legislation for small businesses while it will also seek to ensure that businesses receive appropriate guidance from the Health and Safety Executive on whether they need to consider specific health and safety advice.
It is also hoped that in future years, possibly as soon as 2013, all unnecessary regulations will be revoked with approved codes of practice to give businesses clear examples of how to comply with the law. It also aims, by that year, to see that all self-employed people, whose work does not pose a threat to others, will be exempt from health and safety legislation, a step that the government claims will remove unnecessary bureaucracy.
Professor Lofstedt says that his reforms generally target needless bureaucracy but there is no need for a radical reshaping of the laws as they stand, as they offer “vital protection to employees and the public”.
Family law
Least in the area of family lawwhere 2011 saw a great deal of activity, in particular with the Family Procedure Rules coming into force in April last year. These have provided a single set of rules for family proceedings in the High Court, county courts and magistrates’ courts and included in them has been a requirement for separating couples to be assessed as to whether mediation may be a more suitable way to resolve their differences as opposed to going to court.
Also, the Law Commission set up a consultation on the future of pre-nuptial agreements which is now pending a report, while a regulatory framework for fostering comes into force in April which will include national minimum standards and fostering services regulations.
The Supreme Court also widened the definition of “domestic violence” last year by ruling that it included psychological as well as physical abuse. This followed the court’s decision in the case of Yemshaw v London Borough of Hounslow, where it found that housing officers had been wrong to decide that a woman was not eligible for their help because her husband had not actually hit her or threatened to do so.
As for 2012, it is likely that there will be a continued focus on mediation as a way to settle many disputes in this field, as well as other forms of dispute resolution such as arbitration, particularly because of the heightened cost of taking cases to court. With legal fees in mind it is also quite possible that the New Year will see more litigants in person as more people decide not to pay for the legal advice of a firm of solicitors, opting instead to go it alone, a strategy of course which is not without risk.
2012 will also see a review of the Mediation Information and Assessment Meetings which were introduced last year, which will determine whether or not they have proved to be an effective way of settling disputes. There is also likely to be some clarity introduced to the system of child support after a review which was carried out by the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission.
Employment law
Government plans in the area of employment law include the introduction of fees for employment tribunals which have been announced by the Justice Minister Jonathan Djanogly. As it stands the taxpayer foots the bill for the £84m cost of running the tribunals but under new proposals, those who want to use the system will have to make a financial contribution, though the government wants to ensure that it remains an access to justice for those on low income.
The government says it wants people to pay a reasonable amount towards the costs of their case and it believes the changes may well act as an incentive to businesses and workers to settle problems earlier and avoid the case going to a tribunal in the first case.
A consultation will take place, which will finish by March, with any agreed changes not coming into force before 2013/14. It is looking into two options in particular: the first will see an initial fee of between £150 and £200 for someone wanting to start a claim with a fee of between £250 and £1,250 then being payable if the claim goes to a hearing. There would be no limit to the maximum award.
The second option sees a single fee of between £200 and £600 being payable but this would limit the eventual award to a maximum of £30,000. It is hoped that the proposed changes would lead to both sides in the case considering carefully whether the matter can be resolved satisfactorily without the need to go to a tribunal.
In other matters the Employment Rights (Increase of Limits) Order 2011 will come into force at the start of February and will raise the limit on some employment tribunal awards. The maximum award for unfair dismissal goes up by about £4,000 to £72,300, while the maximum of a week’s pay to calculate a statutory redundancy payment and the basic and additional awards for unfair dismissal goes up from £400 to £430.
Meanwhile, a new Parental Leave Directive comes into force on March 8 and will increase the permitted period of parental leave from three to four months, while the following month will see the standard rate of statutory maternity, paternity and adoption pay increase from £128.73 to £135.45 per week.
2012 will also see changes to pensions law which will affect all employers who employ at least one worker. New employer duties will see them having to automatically enrol certain workers into a pension scheme, making contributions on their worker’s behalf, registering with the Pensions Regulator and giving information to workers about the changes and how they will be affected.
Personal injury law
Some of the changes in personal injury law were contained in a report written by Lord Justice Jackson on reforms in civil law, which was commissioned by the last Labour government. Amongst a number of recommendations which have been taken up by the coalition government there will be big changes to conditional fee agreements where payments for general damages will rise by 10% in return for lawyers subsequently recovering the fees from their winning clients rather than the losing defendants. Fees for claimant lawyers, when successful, will be capped at 25%.
It is hoped that the changes will reduce the costs for losing defendants as, under the present system, they pay more in legal fees than in damages due to the time it can take for cases to come before a judge.
The significance of the proposed changes, if they become law, may see fewer CFAs with a recent poll saying that 69% of firms questioned admitted that if the plans were to be pushed through they would only offer CFAs on very big or strong claims. Meanwhile 88% said that the changes would inhibit the ability of genuine cases to receive justice. So, despite the proposals being included in the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill, it is clear that there is considerable disquiet over the proposed reforms for conditional fee agreements.
Conveyancing
In housing a significant change will be the removal of Stamp Duty Land Tax exemption for first-time buyers. SDLT relief is still available for first-time buyers on all residential properties bought on or after 25 March 2010 and before 25 of March this year.
It is only available to those who have never previously owned a property either in the UK or elsewhere, where they intend for the property to be their only or main home and is only applicable in cases where the cost of the property is £250,000 or less. So, those wanting to get onto the property ladder, have until March to do so without having to pay Stamp Duty.