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The blame game

15 February 2013 / Ian Smith
Issue: 7548 / Categories: Features , Employment
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Ian Smith considers apportioning liability between respondents & the correct approach to Polkey

Highest on the recent newsworthiness index must be the decision of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in the Ladele et al litigation (Eweida and Chaplin v United Kingdom [2011] ECHR 738; Ladele and McFarlane v United Kingdom [2011] ECHR 737) on religious symbolry and objections to certain aspects of a job function. However, this column picks out two other, very different cases which raised difficult points of more prosaic employment law but with both appearing in the national press because of their facts. That factor gives them a unifying element but what most starkly divides them is their final outcomes—in one a lawyer who was unlawfully refused two posts she applied for on racial grounds received in excess of £420,000, whereas in the other a school playtime supervisor who lost her job due to a falling out with the school over a playground incident was eventually awarded £49.99. That is not to say that this is in

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Hugh James—Phil Edwards

Hugh James—Phil Edwards

Serious injury teambolstered by high-profile partner hire

Freeths—Melanie Stancliffe

Freeths—Melanie Stancliffe

Firm strengthens employment team with partner hire

DAC Beachcroft—Tim Barr

DAC Beachcroft—Tim Barr

Lawyers’ liability practice strengthened with partner appointment in London

NEWS
Ceri Morgan, knowledge counsel at Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer LLP, analyses the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Johnson v FirstRand Bank Ltd, which reshapes the law of fiduciary relationships and common law bribery
The boundaries of media access in family law are scrutinised by Nicholas Dobson in NLJ this week
Reflecting on personal experience, Professor Graham Zellick KC, Senior Master of the Bench and former Reader of the Middle Temple, questions the unchecked power of parliamentary privilege
Geoff Dover, managing director at Heirloom Fair Legal, sets out a blueprint for ethical litigation funding in the wake of high-profile law firm collapses
James Grice, head of innovation and AI at Lawfront, explores how artificial intelligence is transforming the legal sector
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