Trade Law, USA

(The Kogan Law Group)/ /Leave a comment

There was legal mention recently about how the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) had increased the difficulty for business to deduct environmental litigation expenses (e.g., property remediation expenses or compliance costs) incurred incident to a U.S. Department of Justice Environmental and Natural Resources Department (DOJ-ENRD)-initiated enforcement action. The inability of a business to deduct expenses incurred…

EU, EU Law, Regulating

(Liege Competition & Innovation Institute)/ /Leave a comment

People within the European Union travel more than ever before for professional or personal reasons. When they do so, the four freedoms enshrined in the TFEU guarantee that they can take with them their siblings, professional qualifications, goods and money. One of the things they could not take with them, however, was their subscription to…

European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), Trade Law, WTO

(Johnson & Johnson Switzerland)/ /Leave a comment

On 28th February 2018 the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA)[1] confirmed that neonicotinoids – a class of pesticides — represent a risk to wild bees, bumble bees, and honeybees because their residues are found in bee pollen and nectar, dust drift during the sowing and application of the treated seeds, and are absorbed into water….

Labor Law, Privacy

(Institute for Labour Law – KU Leuven (Belgium))/ /Leave a comment

On 19 and 20 March 2018 the XVIth annual Conference in Commemoration of Professor Marco Biagi took place in Modena, Italy. The conference is an interdisciplinary classic in the study of comparative labour law, labour markets and industrial relations. It is organized by the Marco Biagi Foundation at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia…

Brexit, EU, UK

(Europa Institute Leiden Law School) and (Europa Institute, Leiden Law School)/ /Leave a comment

On 15 December 2017, the European Council concluded that ‘sufficient progress’ had been reached in the negotiations on the UK withdrawal from the Union to start the second stage of the Brexit procedure. This second stage, scheduled to start this week, should establish a new relationship between the EU-27 and the UK as a third…

Regulating, Renewable Energy, USA, WTO

(U.S. International Trade Commission)/ /Leave a comment

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Paris Agreement was signed in December 2015 to widespread acclaim. Although largely symbolic and non-enforceable, it begat optimism that governments would act to substantially decrease carbon pollution. The agreement focuses on voluntary pledges to reduce carbon pollution in order to limit global warming to a 2.0°…

Canada, Free Trade Agreement, Labor Law, Mexico, NAFTA, Trade Law, USA

(Cassidy Levy Kent LLP)/ /Leave a comment

This the fourth post in a series of posts commenting on the NAFTA renegotiation process. For Part I click here, for Part II click here, for Part III click here.   Reportedly, another thorny proposal being discussed in the renegotiation process is revamping or else doing away with the investor-State dispute settlement mechanism provided under Section B…

Case Law, CJEU, Labor Law

(Institute for Labour Law – KU Leuven (Belgium)) and (KU Leuven, Institute for Labor Law)/ /Leave a comment

Introduction On 21 February 2018, the Court of Justice of the European Union interpreted the notion of ‘working time’ mentioned in the European Working Time Directive (2003/88). The Court stated that stand-by time which a worker spends at home with the duty to respond to calls from his employer must be regarded as ‘working time’….

EU, EU Law, European Court of Human Rights, Labor Law, Privacy, Regulating

(Maynooth University (Ireland))/ /Leave a comment

Tilting at windmills? Innovations in information technology can be both positive and negative when applied to the workplace. On the positive side, there is an extended reach for individuals in any one country. Borders become less of an obstacle. However, regulatory frameworks within jurisdictions may remain hardened. Employment is one regulatory framework in which rigidity…

Regulating

(Liege Competition & Innovation Institute)/ /Leave a comment

The private ridesharing opportunities created by Uber have disrupted existing private transport services to an unprecedented extent. In the wake of the Court of Justice’s recent Elite Taxi judgment (C-434/15), it became clear that Member States primarily remain responsible for the regulation of private ridesharing transport services such as Uber. The most common approach taken…

Canada, Free Trade Agreement, Labor Law, Mexico, NAFTA, Trade Law, USA

(Cassidy Levy Kent LLP)/ /Leave a comment

This the third post in a series of posts commenting on the NAFTA renegotiation process. For Part I click here, for Part II click here.   The rule of origin for conferring duty-free treatment to imports of motor vehicles within the NAFTA region has become one of the most contentious issues in the renegotiation process. Currently,…

Competition Law, EU, EU Law

, (Cleary Gottlieb)/ /Leave a comment

On January 24, 2017, the European Commission announced that it had fined Qualcomm EUR 997,439,000. The Commission thinks that Qualcomm had abused its dominant position to become Apple’s sole supplier of long term evolution (“LTE“) baseband chipsets. The abuse was allegedly committed through exclusive deals, which lasted from 2011 to 2016. Baseband chipsets are key components in smartphones and tablets, which enable connection…

CJEU, Competition Law, EU Law, Regulating

(Europa Institute, Leiden Law School)/ /Leave a comment

Ever since the European Court of Justice brought the rule-making activity of sports federations within the scope of EU law, the European competition rules have emerged as a unique instrument to assert control over sports’ transnational private regulatory power. Other than in the area of revenue-generating activities related to sports (e.g. ticket sales arrangements or…

BIT

(U.S. International Trade Commission)/ /1 Comment

Tobacco harms and kills. Direct or passive consumption of tobacco causes annually the premature deaths of six million people worldwide. Even worse is the frustration, pain, and cost of living with tobacco disease and addiction. Although smoking kills more people than illegal drugs–and nicotine is as addictive as heroin–tobacco remains legal, albeit highly regulated in…

EU Law, European Court of Human Rights, Labor Law, Privacy

(Institute for Labour Law – KU Leuven (Belgium))/ /1 Comment

Recently, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has put privacy in the workplace back to our attention. The fast pace of technological evolutions and the wide availability for consumers of communication and monitoring tools has brought surveillance practices within the immediate reach of employers and human resources practices. Three recent cases of the ECtHR…

CJEU, EU Law, Labor Law

(Osgoode Hall (Canada))/ /Leave a comment

On December 20, 2017, the CJEU passed a landmark case on the legal status of Uber.  On February 19, KU Leuven’s Faculty of Law will hold a conference on the legal status of online intermediaries in the platform economy. Members of the faculty experts in all the relevant branches of the law will comment on…

Brexit, EU Law, Regulating, Social Pillar, UK

(University of Leicester)/ /Leave a comment

As EU-UK negotiations continue on Brexit, a well-known theme re-emerges, the impact of labour regulations on economic growth. As highlighted by David Mangan, UK government policy of ‘lightening’ the burden of employment law on business is a continuing endeavour and is not prevented by EU membership. It has also been argued that the flexibility of…

Brexit, EU

(Legal Consultant) and (Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer)/ /Leave a comment

It’s 2018 and new years’ resolutions are upon us. While many of us seek to quit our vices of smoking or drinking, both the EU and the UK have announced plans to hasten the end another addiction of sorts – the use of plastics. Long identified as an issue, the call to action on plastic…

Brexit, Labor Law, Regulating, UK

(Maynooth University (Ireland))/ /Leave a comment

Employment regulation as an economic stimulus draws attention to the connection between aims and actions. The United Kingdom should remain an intriguing study in this regard. As of 2019, the UK moves into the ‘Global Britain’ or ‘British Way’ era in which the country rebuffs EU-negotiated trade agreements and instead aims to negotiate similar if…

Case Law, CJEU, Competition Law, EU Law

, (Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer)/ /Leave a comment

On Saint Nicholas’ birthday 2017 (6 December), the Court of Justice (the Court) held that selective distribution agreements, which prevent authorised distributors from using unauthorised third-party (online) platforms to sell luxury goods can in principle be compatible with Article 101(1) of the Treaty of the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU); the prohibition on anti-competitive…