Case summaries

The following notes of judgments were prepared by the reporters of the All England Law Reports:

Re M (a minor: costs); FD; Cazalet J; 16 Nov 1994.

Although it was settled law that it was unusual for a court to make an order for costs in a child case where the conduct of a party had not been reprehensible, it was not necessary to fetter a court's discretion as to costs by applying any presumption ofno order as to costs, or by making more specific guidelines.

In considering these questions, the court would always look in particular at whether it was reasonable for one of the parties to have brought or maintained the proceedings and would also have regard to any adverse impact inappropriate orders for costs might have on the relationship between the parties in the longer term.

Judith Parker QC, Rebecca Brown (RWJ Garbett) for the local authority; the respondent in person.

Employment

Leicester University Students' Union v Mahomed; EAT (Pill J, Mr AD Scott, Mr GH Wright); 11 Nov 1994.

Proof of the qualifying period of continuous employment required by section 64 of the Employment Protection (Consolidation) Act 1978, as amended by the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 and the Unfair Dismissal (Variation of Qualifying Period) Order 1985 (SI 782), was a precondition to a finding of unfair dismissal, not a precondition to the jurisdiction of the industrial tribunal hearing the complaint in the first place (though it might often conveniently be taken as a preliminary issue).

Mark Wyatt (Billson & Sharp, Leicester) for the employer; A Zimuto (Makanda & Co) for the employee.

Fraud

Adams v R; PC (Lord Templeman, Lord Jauncey, Lord Browne-Wilkinson, Lord Woolf, Lord Lloyd); 31 Oct 1994.

A person could be guilty of fraud when he dishonestly concealed information from another which he was under a duty to disclose to that other or which that other was entitled to require him to disclose.

Since a company was entitled to recover from directors secret profits made by them at the company's expense, it followed that any dishonest agreement by directors to impede a company in the exercise of its right of recovery would constitute a conspiracy to defraud. A company director who had been party to the use of offshore companies and bank accounts to disguise from legitimate enquiry the source and utilisation of moneys and to conceal information which he was under a duty to disclose to the company,had properly been convicted of conspiracy to defraud.

John Mclinden, Suzanne Clark (of NZ Bar) (Cruickshanks) for the appellants; WGGA Young QC, MA Wooford (of NZ Bar) for the Crown.

Immigration

R v IAT ex p Yasin; CA (Nourse, Mann, Rose LJJ); 20 Oct 1994.

Where two brothers, against whom deportation orders had been made, both appealed to the Immigration Appeal Tribunal, the tribunal when hearing one appeal was not under a duty to consider the outcome of the other. Its failure to do so, therefore, did not justify the quashing of the decision.

Clare Montgomery (Treasury Solicitor) for the appellant; Ian MacDonald QC (BM Birnberg & Co) for the respondent.

Scotland

R v Metropolitan Police Commissioner & Chief Constable of Grampian Police, ex p Bennett; QB (Div Ct) (Rose LJ, Potts J); 1 Nov 1994.

The Divisional Court had no jurisdiction to review judicially the issue or execution of a warrant issued in Scotland because article XIX of the Union with Scotland Act 1706 did not permit it.