2004 has again been a very busy year on the M&A and Corporate Finance front, with the building materials, financial services, media and the property sectors dominating. The take private arena has been particularly active. Having been privatised in 2002, eircom was floated again earlier in the year with a market capitalisation of €1.1 billion ...
&L Goodbody recently represented the Irish Nightclub Industry Association (INIA) and the Irish Hotels Federation (IHF) against Phonographic Performance (Ireland) Limited (PPI) in a case on copyright law which is a landmark judgment not only in Ireland but elsewhere. The INIA and IHF challenged an arbitrator’s award which had set copyright fees payable by nightclubs to Phonographic Performance (Ireland) Limited – “PPI” ...
Earlier this year members of Fianna Fáil (the main opposition party to the Government) introduced the Gambling Control Bill 2018 as a Private Members' Bill. The Gambling Control Bill 2018 is largely based on the General Scheme for a Gambling Control Bill which was published by the Irish Government in 2013. The General Scheme was essentially an outline of what was to be included in the Bill once drafted ...
Background The UK invoked the exit procedure under Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union in March 2017. Unless the UK's decision is withdrawn or the period is extended, this will become effective in a little over 80 days ...
The EU Directives on Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) and the Restriction of certain Hazardous Substances in Electronic and Electrical Equipment (ROHS) are due to take effect from 13 August 2005. The Department of the Environment recently produced draft regulations to implement these directives and make the necessary amendments to existing waste legislation ...
This Order . which came into effect on 1 December 2005, facilitates the expansion of the electronic filing system in the Companies Registration Office. Companies may now appoint Electronic Filing Agents to sign and file documents with the CRO in electronic form. The Minister of State at the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Mr Michael Ahern, stated, “The introduction of a statutory Electronic Filing Agent will greatly simplify the process for companies and their agents ...
The Minister of State in the Department of Justice and Equality, Mr. David Stanton, has expressed an intention to bring forward the long awaited Gambling Control Bill (the GCB) by the end of 2017. The Government's Legislation Programme for Autumn 2017 notes that work is underway on the GCB. However, there has been no further information on when the draft of the GCB will be published, which is the next substantive step ...
A Ministerial Order (S.I. 541/2014) has been passed commencing Part 3 of the Criminal Justice (Mutual Assistance) Act 2008 (the Act), from last Monday 1 December, 2014. The Act provides for various forms of mutual legal assistance to foreign law enforcement authorities. Part 3 concerns requests for mutual assistance between Ireland and other Member States of the EU for interception of telecommunications messages for the purposes of criminal investigations ...
Eurofood IFSC Limited: Opinion of Advocate General Jacobs, 27 September 2005, Case C-341-04 This significant opinion by Advocate General Jacobs clarifies provisions of the Insolvency Regulation (1346/2000) concerning a company’s centre of main interests (COMI) and the recognition of judgments in the courts of other EU Member States. While concerning Irish and Italian entities, the case has attracted interest across the EU ...
EC (Protection of Employees (Employers’ Insolvency)) Regulations 2005, SI No. 630 of 2005 The Protection of Employees (Employers’ Insolvency )Act 1984 established rights to certain payments for employees of insolvent companies. New Regulations from the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment provide additional protections to employees of insolvent companies, amending and updating the 1984 Act ...
Until recently, employers in Ireland were only obliged to consult with employees in very limited circumstances, such as collective redundancies and transfer of undertakings. Those obligations will remain intact, however the provisions of the Employees (Provision of Information and Consultation) Bill 2005, will provide employees in undertakings of at least 50 employees with the right to information and consultation in the workplace on a greater number of issues ...
As part of Budget 2019, the Irish Minister for Finance announced that Irish betting tax will increase from 1% to 2% of turnover. Betting intermediary tax will also increase from 15% to 25%. The tax increases will take effect from 1 January 2019. Parties in support of this increase have suggested that additional revenue generated by this increase should be directed towards gambling addiction services ...
Introduction A common question for clubs, events, and governing bodies at all levels of sport is what is the best legal structure to use - club or company? In this article we take a practical look at the pros and cons of the most likely options for your club or governing body. 1. Unincorporated Association A. What Is It? ● A group of individuals coming together to carry out a mutual activity, in common language a club ...
This article is intended to provide some solutions on how to reduce the amount of parallel imports of your products into Ireland without breaching European law. Parallel trade of products occurs within the European Union (EU) as EU legislation provides for the free movement of goods within the EU. This rule frequently results in products being imported from cheaper countries within the EU (for example Greece) to more expensive countries within the EU (for example Ireland) ...
Allied Irish Bank PLC -v- Moloney & anor [2016] IEHC 346 Twomey J, 20 June 2016, concerned an application by Allied Irish Bank (AIB) for summary judgment in the sum of €10.8m. The defendants contested the application claiming that they had a binding oral agreement with AIB, whereby it was agreed that the defendants would sell the properties charged to AIB, and the outstanding loan would be written off. The fact of the borrowings was not disputed ...
For the first time, the Irish High Court has been asked to make a blocking order in regard to the illegal live streaming of Premier League games. Instead of watching Premier League games through legitimate and licensed services, some people were seeking to do so free of charge ...
The High Court has delivered judgment in the case of Minch v The Commissioner of Environmental Information (CEI) (16 February 2016) concerning the scope of access to environmental information ...
The Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act, 2005 was signed into law by the President on the 1 July. It will not come into force, however, until the 1 September. The new Act makes it easier to impose criminal liability on directors, managers, and other similar officers who control the operations of employers. It increases the penalties in the District Court and the maximum fine in the Circuit Court is €3,000,000 ...
In our previous ezines we tracked the progress of the Alcohol Products (Control of Advertising, Sponsorship and Marketing Practices/Sales Promotions) Bill. The Bill was set to have a major impact on the relationship between alcohol advertising and sport in Ireland but a recent controversial turnabout by the Government means that the Bill may never be enacted ...
GoodCorporation, the standards organisation for responsible business practice, today officially announced the launch of its service in Ireland. The first organisation of its kind to operate in Ireland, GoodCorporation audits companies for corporate social responsibility practices and provides benchmarking against which member companies can measure their performance ...
The funds industry in Ireland has exceeded US$500 billion (over €410 Billion), according to the latest edition of Fitzrovia International’s Dublin Fund Encyclopaedia. A&L Goodbody remains the leading legal adviser by net asset value, representing funds in excess of US$149 billion, i.e. 25.8% of all funds in the Irish market ...
The High Court judgment in Friends of the Irish Environment v. An Bord Pleanála (delivered in 2018 by Meenan J) decided that if a Section 5 referral is made by a third party, then the owners and occupiers of the lands must be identified and served with notice of the referral, and given an opportunity to make submissions in accordance with basic fair procedures ...
On 6 June 2012, the European Commission announced new crisis management measures to deal effectively on a cross border basis and in a harmonised manner with any future bank crisis ...
On 26 June 2013, a new Commission Regulation on what telecommunications operators (Telcos) and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) should do if their customers' personal data is lost, stolen or otherwise compromised, was published in the Official Journal of the European Union. The purpose of the new rules is to ensure businesses, operating in more than one EU country, can take a pan-EU approach in the event of a data breach ...
The European Commission has today adopted the Privacy Shield. The Privacy Shield is intended to provide a framework for EU-US data transfers. What is the Privacy Shield? European data protection law restricts the transfer of personal data outside the European Economic Area (EEA) unless the country to which the data is transferred ensures an adequate level of data protection ...
