<p>Filter Knowledge</p>

The UK Government has today announced a package of reforms to UK financial services regulation. It mostly consists of promises to consult on specific areas for reform over the next couple of years.

Read the full PMI Environmental, Social & Governance (ESG) Report 2022 here: Environmental, Social & Governance (ESG) Report - The Pensions Management Institute (pensions-pmi.org.uk)

A guide to future employment and immigration law.

Last week the Government announced that it will be introducing legislation that enables judges to use procedural shortcuts to dismiss so-called Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (or "SLAPPs") at an early stage. This follows a campaign by UK newspapers to prevent wealthy individuals from issuing SLAPPs with the intention of preventing legitimate public interest journalism.

In MUR Shipping BV v RTI Ltd, the Court of Appeal ruled that a force majeure clause did not apply because the party unable to comply with its obligations had offered suitable alternative performance (as envisaged by the clause, which included a reasonable endeavours obligation).  In doing so, it reversed the decision at first instance, where the court ruled that the shipowners were entitled to insist on being paid in US dollars, not euros, as required by the contract. The case highlights the difficulties in relying on force majeure clauses, even where (as here) the contract is affected by US sanctions.

In this article, first published in the November 2022 edition of Butterworth's Journal of International Banking and Financial Law, Partner John Lee considers a key potential value proposition of smart contracts and its limits.

We reported last summer on the Government's 2021 consultation about the design and implementation of the Building Safety Levy (the "Levy"). It is intended to contribute to the costs of anticipated building safety expenditure to ensure that neither the taxpayer nor tenants have to pay for the remediation of safety defects in the existing high-rise housing stock. Since that consultation, the scope of the Levy has expanded to apply to all new residential developments that require building control approval (with a few exceptions). The Building Safety Act 2022 has also been enacted, section 58 of which gives the Secretary of State broad powers to raise a Levy on any in-scope building.

A regular briefing for the alternative asset management industry. 

There is plenty going on of interest to those in the real estate sector, both domestically (e.g. the recent “mini-Budget” and Autumn Statement announcements) and internationally (e.g. the signing of a new UK/Luxembourg double tax treaty), and with so many tax developments progressing it can be difficult to stay on top of things. Our briefing provides a checklist of the key tax issues to be aware of (including future developments) and sets out the actions you should be undertaking now in preparation.

Claimants are finding novel ways to advance collective proceedings, including the increasingly popular collective proceedings regime in the Competition Appeal Tribunal ("CAT").  While this regime was introduced to facilitate competition law claims, claimant law firms are finding creative ways to use it for matters that do not appear, at first blush, to be "competition" related matters at all. 

Travers Smith has written the UK chapters of the Practical Law and Chambers global outsourcing guides. The chapters cover the latest legal information and many of the key issues to consider on UK outsourcing.

On 18 November 2022, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) published a consultation on the text of proposed draft guidelines relating to the use of ESG or sustainability related terms in funds' names (the Draft Guidelines).

The Government has confirmed that it will legislate in this Parliament to reform key aspects of UK competition and consumer protection law. There are reports that it is looking to bring these changes into force late next year – so businesses affected by it should start considering the implications now.

On 17 November 2022, the ICO revised its guidance on international transfers, created a new section on transfer risk assessments (TRA) and released a new TRA tool.  The new TRA tool can be used to undertake a transfer risk assessment, which is required where there's a restricted transfer of data outside the UK (not covered by UK "adequacy regulations") that relies upon an "appropriate safeguards" mechanism in Article 46 of the UK GDPR, such as standard contractual clauses.  

Welcome to the inaugural edition of the Travers Smith Infrastructure newsletter.

This article was first published in Trust Law International (Bloomsbury Professional) at (2022) 3 TLI 103.

As COP27 drew to a close on the afternoon of Friday 18 November, following two weeks of the conference in Sharm el-Sheikh, the first drafts of the COP27 agreement were published, but getting the deal finalised looked to be a difficult task.

A regular briefing for the alternative asset management industry.