Northern Ireland

More than a million audio or video connections have been made for remote and hybrid hearings in the Northern Ireland courts between the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in March 2020 and the end of December 2021. The Northern Ireland Courts and Tribunals Service (NICTS) said 56 courtrooms are now digi

Belfast-based Francis Hanna & Co Solicitors has announced the appointment of three new partners.  Jennifer Young, Karen Connolly and Ruth Flinn, who between them have over 45 years' experience in their specialist areas of law, have each been promoted from associate solicitor to partner.

A change in the law to require court approval of all children's compensation claims in Northern Ireland has been backed by an overwhelming majority of responses to a Department of Justice consultation.

Trainee solicitors Jemma Smyth and Georgia Holley have triumphed in the regional heat of the Law Society of Northern Ireland's Client Consultation Competition 2022. Ms Smyth and Ms Holley made up the team from the Institute of Professional Legal Studies at Queen's University Belfast, going head to h

A public consultation has been launched on proposals to replace zero-hour contracts in Northern Ireland with banded weekly hour contracts in cases where a worker’s hours, as set out in their contract, do not reflect the actual hours worked each week. Stormont's economy committee has begun its

Northern Ireland's draft budget, which included controversial cuts to justice funding, has effectively been scrapped in the absence of a first minister and deputy first minister. Finance minister Conor Murphy yesterday told MLAs that legal advice from the Departmental Solicitor's Office (DSO) and th

The Northern Ireland Prison Service has set out its plans to remove most restrictions introduced in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, including the reintroduction of in-person contact visits. The six-week "road to recovery" plan sets out what the prison service aims to have in place by Monday 4 Apr

MKB Law has become the first law firm in Northern Ireland to achieve the 2022 GDPR certification for law firms from Briefed. Briefed has created bespoke GDPR training for law firms, meeting all ICO standards, which allows firms to annually certify directors, associates, support staff and trainees at

A Stormont committee has failed to agree on a way forward for a bill of rights for Northern Ireland after nearly two years of work. The ad hoc committee on a bill of rights, established in February 2020, yesterday published its report, based on engagement with a wide range of experts in human rights

Northern Ireland’s High Court has dismissed two applications for judicial review challenging The Abortion (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2021. The court found that the EU-UK Withdrawal Agreement had not impacted human rights laws involving abortion on the grounds of severe foetal impairment, a

Professor Joan Loughrey has been appointed as head of Queen's University Belfast (QUB) School of Law. She joins QUB from the University of Leeds, where she served as interim head of the school of law from 2020 until 2021. She also served as deputy head of school there from 2013 to 2019, and as direc

Northern Ireland could be stuck with its current Covid-19 restrictions for some time in the absence of a fully-functioning Executive to make decisions on relaxing them, it has emerged. The Northern Ireland (Ministers, Elections and Petitions of Concern) Act 2022, which came into force earlier this m

Proposed cuts to Northern Ireland's justice budget would create "legal aid deserts" with access to justice severely curtailed or completely non-existent in many local towns, Stormont's justice committee will be warned today. Representatives from the Law Society and the Bar will tell MLAs that propos

Northern Ireland’s High Court has dismissed a judicial review application where the original proceedings were still ongoing, and where the applicant failed to mount a case for early release or mercy. This was an application for leave to apply for judicial review where the applicant was seeking

Legislation to make decisions taken by Northern Ireland's charity regulator before 2019 lawful has cleared all stages in the Northern Ireland Assembly. The Charities Bill was introduced in response to concerns raised by the charity sector following the Court of Appeal's ruling in McKee & Others