News

Northern Ireland's Department of Justice has published the Northern Ireland Modern Slavery Strategy 2019–2020. The third annual strategy underlines the Department’s commitment to working in partnership with a wide range of agencies in the fight against modern slavery.

Two students in Italy have been fined €27 million by forest authorities after allegedly letting a barbecue start a forest fire. The administration sanction was handed down by the forestry service based on the area of land which was affected and its value per square metre.

Dozens of people who were allegedly involved in breaking bones and staging car accidents as part of a massive insurance fraud have been arrested. Thirty-four suspects are accused of taking part in a major scam whereby they inflicted serious injuries on people in exchange for part of their insurance

Cork lawyer Philip O'Leary, managing partner at FitzGerald Legal & Advisory, has been appointed to the Irish Banking Culture Board (IBCB). Mr O'Leary brings over 20 years of specialised experience in representing financial institutions in the areas of new lending, restructuring, asset sales and

The Government's embattled Judicial Appointments Commission Bill has not completed committee stage in the Seanad before Easter despite a bid to end the long-running parliamentary debate yesterday morning. Senators defeated an attempt to guillotine the committee stage debate on the bill, which Justic

A bill which would stop banks from selling loans to investment funds without borrowers' permission has won backing from legal rights group FLAC. Chief executive Eilis Barry and senior policy analyst Paul Joyce gave evidence on Sinn Féin's No Consent, No Sale Bill 2019 to the joint Oireachtas

New statistics relating to the victims of serious reported crimes in Ireland has been published by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) for the first time. The new release, the first in a new annual Recorded Crime Victims series, has been made possible following an assessment of the quality of data r

The Road Safety Authority (RSA) and An Garda Síochána are set to launch their biggest Easter road safety campaign in years following an 11 per cent increase in road fatalities. There have been 50 road deaths in Ireland this year so far, compared to 45 over the same period last year, th

Roisin Harper, associate at McKinty and Wright Solicitors, current NI regional representative for the Forum of Insurance Lawyers (FOIL) and past NI representative to Tomorrow’s FOIL, writes on the latest update to personal injury damages guidelines. As of 25th February 2019, the 5th Edition of

A retired Supreme Court justice has said there is "no moral obligation to obey the law" in a major intervention over the legality of assisted suicide. Jonathan Sumption QC, who retired from the Supreme Court bench last December, said he believed the law "should be broken from time to time".

Controversial UK government plans to bring in the world's first age-verification system for online pornography are set to come into force in July. The commencement of the relevant provisions of the Digital Economy Act 2017 has been repeatedly delayed, having originally been set for April 2018 and la

An English solicitor who said her professional reputation had been destroyed by a Facebook post has lost her £900,000 libel claim. The High Court in London ruled that lawyers for Dr Katherine Alexander-Theodotou, of Highgate Hill Solicitors, had not established that the post had caused "seriou

An Orthodox priest in Russia has been relocated to a remote village in a bizarre act of punishment after his wife won a beauty pageant. Sergei Zotov was dismissed from his post and sent to a village of just 4,000 people around 65 kilometres away.

A&L Goodbody (ALG) has announced the appointment of Eileen Roberts as chair of the partnership from next month, succeeding current chair Catherine Duffy. Ms Duffy will complete her three-year term as chair on 1 May 2019 and continue in her role as one of the firm's senior finance partners.

Arthur Cox has announced the appointment of Eileen Burns as head of the firm's legal tech and innovation services group.