Vexatious Claims: Challenging the Case for Employment Tribunal Fees

Since July 2013, recourse to Employment Tribunals in the United Kingdom has attracted fees of up to £1,200 for single claimants. The impact of this reform has been dramatic: within a year, claims dropped by nearly 80 per cent. This paper suggests that this fee regime is in clear violation of domestic and international norms, including Article 6(1) ECHR and the EU principle of effective judicial protection. Drawing on rational choice theory and empirical evidence, we argue that the resulting payoff structures, negative for the majority of successful claimants, strike at the very essence of these rights. The measures are, furthermore, disproportionate in light of the Government's stated policy aims: fees have failed to transfer cost away from taxpayers, have failed to encourage early dispute resolution, and have failed to deter vexatious litigants. The only vexatious claims, we find, appear to be those which motivated the reforms in the first place.     

The Employment Appeal Tribunal: October 2002-July 2005

The Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) has been governed by theEAT Rules¹ since 1993 (amended in 2001), and in 1996, Sir JohnMummery, the then president, issued a Practice Direction whichenshrined the practice that had been developed and honed overthe 20 years of the EAT existence. The changes over the past3 years have now been reflected in the 2004 amendments to theEAT Rules and by two further Practice Directions, first in December2002, to implement the effect of the changes introduced in practiceas from October 2002 and then in December 2004, once they hadbedded in, to adjust to the amended Rules, which had also reflectedthose changes. This article is written for the purpose of summarisingthose changes and reflecting upon their effect.     

权利要求策划的基本目标、常用策略及一种工具

权利要求的策划或设计,是指整个权利要求书的基本内容及结构的确定,包括确定每一项权利要求记载的技术特征,各项权利要求之间的引用关系,此外还涉及说明书内容的某些相关安排。在表面上看,权利要求的策划就是权利要求书的提纲草拟,是权利要求撰写工作的一部分。其实,它是整个专利申请活动的终极目标     

Parker's Modern Wills Precedents, 5th edn * By Michael Waterworth MA (Cantab)

Trusts set up by will, will trusts, are governed by similarconsiderations to those affecting inter vivos trusts. Frequentlyin trust textbooks the authors do not tell us that will trustshave some significant difference from inter vivos trusts. Thelatter may be set up quite informally by a mere declarationof intention and the transfer of the trust property to the trustees.But will trusts can only come about if the law relating to makinga valid will has been complied with. This tends to get overlookedunder the shadow of possible inheritance tax     

反思知识产权请求权理论——知识产权要挟策略与知识产权请求权的限制

作为我国知识产权体系化理论中的重要组成部分,知识产权请求权理论被我国司法和立法所接受.然而,严重偏离知识产权立法目的之知识产权要挟策略出现了,要挟策略采纳者借助于知识产权请求权制度向无过错侵权人收取高额许可使用费,或者排斥正当竞争,从而对后续创新产生损害.我国现有的立法和司法实践不仅不能制约反而鼓励这种行为.这表明,为实现知识产权的立法目的必须建立知识产权请求权限制制度.     

Making a Difference? Legal Representation in Employment Tribunal Cases: Evidence from a Survey of Representatives

Representatives play a critical rôle in Employment Tribunal(ET) cases in the UK. Using a recently published survey of representativesin ET cases, this article explores the particular rôleof lawyers. The key results are that lawyers may both shortenand lengthen case resolution by encouraging early withdrawaland late tribunal resolution of cases respectively. They alsoappear to impact on the terms of settlement, achieving betteroutcomes for their clients than alternative representative types.     

Promises,Rights and Claims

The paper argues that promise rights presuppose independently existing (if not pre-existing) claims. The argument relies on the Bifurcation Thesis, according to which all claims, and all rights, can be exhaustively divided into two categories: capacity based and exercise based.     

民生诉求与权利回归：论就业机会公平分享的推进机制

一、问题的提出 就业是民生之本，是安邦之策。然而。在目前情形下，我们必须承认，我们正面临就业不力与就业不平等的双重困局，其中，就业机会不平等是亟待解决的一个重大问题。就业机会不平等仅仅是对中国整个就业状况的某种折射，它所反映的是更深远和更深刻的社会现象和社会问题。     

Claims of amnesia for criminal offenses: psychopathology, substance abuse, and malingering

The forensic psychiatric examiner often encounters defendants who deny memory for their offense. Past research proposes a variety of factors to account for offense amnesia. To date there have been few systematic studies of offense amnesia in relation to psychiatric diagnosis, either alone or in combination with other known factors such as substance use and malingering. We studied 53 pretrial felony defendants who had been referred for psychiatric examination; 40% claimed amnesia for their offense. Examinees with psychotic disorders in general, and schizophrenia in particular, were relatively less likely to claim amnesia than were examinees with other diagnoses. Substance use at the time of the offense and associated substance use disorder diagnoses were positively associated with offense amnesia. Malingering diagnosed by general clinical criteria was a poor predictor of amnesia claims. These data suggests that two prominent reasons for referral for forensic psychiatric evaluation include the presence of psychotic symptoms and claims of amnesia for the offense.     

The Aftermath of the Macondo Discovery Well Spill: The Interplay of Claims to the Gulf Coast Claims Facility and Insurance Claims

The processing of claims for compensation arising from the April 20, 2010, explosion of the Deepwater Horizon offshore oil rig and its environmental and economic aftermath has proceeded simultaneously before the Gulf Coast Claims Facility and insurers. The criteria for recovery between these two recipients of claims differ significantly. Compensation from the facility has included claims for purely economic injury, whereas compensation from insurance generally requires, inter alia, a closer geographic or causal nexus to property damage. The resolution of compensation issues both by the facility and insurers will impact whether further disputes arise in the courts. Based upon similar experiences from September 11 and Hurricane Katrina, these issues are likely to continue for several years before they are fully resolved.     

Contract, Employment and the Contract of Employment

Many of the rights and duties of the parties in an employmentrelationship arise out of the characterisation of the contractof employment as such. Employment also occurs by virtue of thefact that a contract of employment has been entered into. Inconsequence, it is natural to think of the contract of employmentand the employment relationship as co-existent. It is thus ofsome importance, both in legal theory and in practice, to establisha logical account of the rights and obligations between theparties that exist because of the contract of employment otherthan during the period of employment, both after and possiblybefore that relationship exists. Various possible accounts areexplored, and the conclusion is reached that the theoreticalnexus between employment and contracts of employment shouldbe broken in order to provide a more logical conceptual framework.     

Implementing Prior Judicial Decisions as Precedents: The Context of Application and Justification

The paper concerns the conditions and methods of using previous judicial decisions as a kind of precedents in the processes of application of law within the statutory legal order. The use of such decisions, not announced by the legislator, depends on the courts, undertaking such actions on the grounds of similarity of cases or of decisional processes. Such decisions do not become an exclusive validation argument and may create a situation of their potential conflict with legal regulations as well as an inferential supplementation of their content. Dissemination of such activity of the courts leads to the development of precedential practice (relevant to the statutory legal order), though, its actual jurisdictional role depends on proper justification of decisions, within which reference to these decisions should be adaptive (in relation to the elements of the current case), generalizing (forming elements of ratio decidendi) as well as argumentative and discursive (in respect of the way in which the decisional reasoning and arguments expressed in the prior justification are used).

     

Tribunal Reform: Proportionate Dispute Resolution and the Pursuit of Administrative Justice

The article considers some unresolved policy choices associated with the implementation of 'proportionate dispute resolution', one of the most interesting ideas in the Department of Constitutional Affairs' White Paper Transforming Public Services: Complaints, Redress and Tribunals , published in 2004. It attempts to put the White Paper into context by tracing the Government's concern with tribunal reform over the last 50 years. It briefly compares the Franks Report, published in 1957, with the Leggatt Report, published in 2001, and outlines the steps that led to the publication, three years later, of the White Paper. It then analyses the similarities and differences in the approaches to reform taken by the Leggatt Report and the White Paper. The article focuses on the principle of 'proportionate dispute resolution', the idea that the ways in which cases are dealt with should reflect the nature of the dispute and what the person in dispute with a public body wishes to achieve. Seven policy options are considered, all of which hold out the prospect of enhancing administrative justice, either by reducing the incidence of disputes or by handling them more effectively. They are then assessed in terms of how well they are likely to do so.     

农民、就业与法律父爱主义——以《就业促进法》为例

在现代化转型的大背景下,农民就业成为涉及全局的大问题,也是相关立法必须解决的难题。如果立法中的规定强调政府主导而不注重权利保护,就可能导致法律父爱主义的倾向。《就业促进法》浓厚的法律父爱主义色彩埋下了政府裁量权过大、农民就业权受侵蚀等隐患。为此,应彰显农民的就业权利和自由,以理性、确定和比例三原则来规制政府行为,淡化甚至褪去立法的父爱主义色彩,走出价值悖论的迷宫,使该法善始善终,最终实现其促进就业的目的。     

放弃请求制度的理论、释疑和立法建议

本文分析了放弃诉讼请求的性质和特征,认为放弃诉讼请求是民事诉讼法上的一个独立概念,它与撤诉有显著的区别。在此基础上,本文澄清了我国司法实践中因放弃诉讼请求所产生的一系列问题,最后提出了若干立法建议,认为放弃诉讼请求制度至少应包括如下内容:在法庭言词辩论阶段,可以放弃诉讼请求;一方放弃诉讼请求,不必得到对方当事人的同意;放弃请求可明示,也可默示;放弃请求后,诉权被消灭,禁止重新起诉。     

Insurers, Claims and the Boundaries of Good Faith

This article examines the refusal of the English courts to award damages for consequential losses following unreasonable delay on the part of insurers in settling a claim. This has the potential to give rise to dire consequences for insureds. These difficulties have been addressed in North American jurisdictions where the concept of good faith has been developed and applied as a means of both compensating insureds and regulating the conduct of insurers. However, a hallmark of English law is that it fails to draw a bright line between the law of contract and the law of contracts. As a result, the policy issues that should inform insurance contracts are excluded by virtue of the notion, imported from the law of contract, that the contractual relationship is a matter of private law and is not, therefore, a means for public regulation of insurers.     

Precedents in the Mountains: On the Parallels and Uniqueness of the Cases of Kosovo, South Ossetia and Abkhazia

International law, especially its customary part, evolves toa great extent through acts of State practice serving as precedents.If States do not want that their behaviour becomes law (i.e.if they prefer to act contrary to Kant's categorical imperative),they claim that certain acts of their behaviour are so unique,so peculiar that they must not be considered as contributingto the change of law (they express their opinio non juris).In the 1990s, the UN Security Council also found that only uniquenessof situations in Somalia, Haiti and Bosnia-Herzegovina justifiedthe use of "all necessary means" to deal with those situations.More recently, the recognition of the independence of Kosovoby a number of States and the recognition of Abkhazia and SouthOssetia by Russia were described by recognizing States as beingso unique, so sui generis that they could not serve as precedents.The article argues that the uniqueness, or parallels for thatmatter, is usually in the eye of the beholder. Whether certainsituations, facts or acts serve as precedents depends to a greatextent on whether one is interested in seeing them as precedentsor not. People too often act upon their ideologies, beliefsand prejudices, not upon facts; the latter are interpreted inthe light of preconceived ideas, or as Charles King, writingof the Georgia–Russian war, observes, "unfortunately,Western thinking of Russia has too often substituted analogyfor analysis" ("Putin's March to the Sea", Foreign Affairs,Vol. 87, No. 6, November–December 2008). Then this articleproceeds to study in greater detail parallels and differencesbetween Kosovo, on the one hand, and Abkhazia and South Ossetia,on the other. The study ends with an inquest into the matterof how different States (or categories of States) deal withsecessionist problems.