Recently, Clover House in Halifax has been named as one of the worst care homes in the country. A Care Quality Commission report dated 22nd May 2018 rated Clover House as inadequate in the safe, effective, caring, responsive and well led categories. The home supports up to 39 residents with dementia or other mental health issues yet the CQC found that there were not enough staff, mealtimes were chaos, staff were maneuvering residents in an unsafe and inappropriate manner and alarm systems which are used to alert staff to any falls were not being used. The CQC found that residents were not getting the correct nutrition and hydration that they needed.

Official data has revealed that teenage girls and single parents are among the most likely victims of domestic abuse. Statistics have found that 7.6% of 16-19 year old girls had been the victim of abuse by a partner or ex-partner in the last 12 months, with 7.4% of 20-24 year olds also experiencing domestic abuse from a partner or ex-partner.

On 6th April 2018 the rules on taxation of termination payments in employment changed. HMRC have published guidance on the new rules that require income tax and national insurance contributions (“NICs”) to be paid on all payments in lieu of notice (“PILONS”), whether contractual or not.

The recent case of Toone v Robbins 2018 provides a useful reminder to Directors and Shareholders of the potential consequences of taking cash out of a company. Although dividends are a seen to be an attractive tax efficient way to take cash out of a company, such payments are only lawful if there are sufficient distributable reserves in the company.

Huge thank you to our Ramsdens runners who took part in the Race for Life 5k in Huddersfield, to every single person that donated to our challenge and those that marshalled on the day. This wasn’t the first time that the ladies at Ramsdens have taken part to raise funds for Cancer Research UK……..and they are already looking forward to next year’s run.

Employers that require workers to wear a uniform at work cannot make deductions to a worker’s wage for the cost of the uniform if it brings their wage below the National Minimum Wage (“NMW”).

The government has issued a response to its proposals to introduce a register of beneficial owners of overseas companies that own property in the UK in an attempt to tackle corruption. The government is proposing that all legal entities that hold property or wish to acquire property in the UK in the future will have to provide details of beneficial ownership to Companies House.

The Supreme Court in the recent case of Newcastle upon Tyne Hospital NHS Foundation Trust v Haywood held that a new term is to be implied in all employment contracts in relation to terminating employment. It was held that notice to terminate employment will only start to run from the date that an employee has received a letter and has had a reasonable opportunity to read it.