News

Crofters in some of Scotland’s most remote and marginal communities are to benefit from grants to improve their housing or build new homes. The Croft House Grant scheme aims to retain and attract people to rural communities while allowing them to achieve the full potential of crofts and genera

Andrew McConnell has been made a director at DWF in Glasgow. Mr McConnell acts exclusively for professional indemnity insurance clients and regularly handles high value, complex claims giving advice on all matters concerning liability, causation and quantum.

A bill to address the rise in dog attacks on livestock will be debated at Holyrood today. The Protection of Livestock (Amendment) (Scotland) Bill would increase the penalties for dog-owners whose pets chase, attack or kill farmed animals.

The Law Society of Scotland is inviting nominations for honorary membership for outstanding service for the public good by a Scottish solicitor. Honorary membership has been awarded to 18 solicitors in its 72-year history. The most recent recipients, Alistair Cockburn, Sheriff Brian Kearney and Dame

Egyptian police have arrested a woman who made "indecent" cupcakes. Photos of the controversial cakes, some of which had frosting shaped like buttocks and underwear, went viral on social media.

The UK Supreme Court has ruled that business interruption losses resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic are recoverable under a variety of insurance policies after appeals by both the Financial Conduct Authority and various insurance companies. The original proceedings by the FCA w

The Lord Advocate suggested using terrorism legislation to deal with the pandemic, the Scottish government has inadvertently revealed due to improperly redacting his comments in material released following a freedom of information request. James Wolffe QC told ministers that the Civil Contingencies

The Scottish Parliament has voted in favour of the Protection of Workers (Retail and Age-restricted Goods and Services) (Scotland) Bill.  The member’s bill was brought forward by Daniel Johnson MSP and will create a new statutory offence of assaulting, threatening or abusing a retail

Scottish Legal News is asking readers whether it is time to ditch the salutation 'Dear Sirs' from correspondence following calls for its abandonment. In a letter to the Journal of the Law Society of Scotland, bearing the salutation "Dear Colleagues", Seonaid Stevenson-McCabe, Katy MacAskill and M&ag

Following last week’s announcement that during the latest lockdown the criminal courts will focus on the most serious cases, seven sheriff courts are now running jury trials linked to remote jury centres. Edinburgh, Glasgow, Ayr, Paisley, Kilmarnock, Hamilton and Airdrie Sheriff Courts are now

Addleshaw Goddard’s corporate team in Scotland has said it is confident that there will continue to be a strong pipeline of deal activity despite challenges caused by the ongoing pandemic and the impact of Brexit. With proposed changes to capital gains tax on the horizon for March 2021, the fi

There were more High Court evidence led trials in December 2020 than during the same period in the preceding two years amid severe delays caused by the pandemic, new figures from the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service (SCTS) show. Remote jury centres enabled 29 High Court evidence led trials

The "unprecedented and very serious" backlog in the criminal courts due to the Covid-19 pandemic poses a serious risk to the criminal justice system, the four justice watchdogs in England and Wales have warned. In a joint report, the police, prosecutors, prisons and probation inspectorates expressed

The Scottish Hospitals Inquiry will hold the first of its public hearings in September 2021 where it plans to hear from affected patients and families.

The Scottish Law Agents’ Society has highlighted the problems facing the profession in obtaining CPD following the Law Society of Scotland’s re-imposition of it in full as of the current practice year. Andrew Stevenson, secretary of the Society, said: “Covid lockdown has drive