News archive

Outer House case concerning an arbitration in relation to a lease and option to purchase (governed by missives, a minute of agreement and a minute of lease) Pentlandfield Business Park in Roslin.

Robert Ferguson had been a partner in a firm (subsequently dissolved) which was the landlord and seller of the business park. MITT was the purchaser and tenant. An arbitration commenced between the parties in respect of a clause imposing liability for repair and maintenance of the business park on the landlord. Mr Ferguson sought an interim interdict preventing the arbitration from progressing arguing:

1. that (by ruling on a claim that arose under the missives and minute of agreement rather than the lease when only the lease contained an arbitration clause) the arbiter had exceeded his jurisdiction; and
2. that the arbiter had no power to assess or award damages as the arbitration was governed by the common law.

Lord Hodge was not persuaded that Mr Ferguson had demonstrated a prima face case for interim interdict. The court would only interdict an arbiter from proceeding with an arbitration in exceptional circumstances which did not exist in this case. If, as Mr Ferguson contended, MITT did not have a valid claim under the clause in the lease, the arbiter would be able to dismiss the claim as irrelevant after a proof, the arbiter having jurisdiction to decide whether the claim under the lease was relevant.

With regard to the jurisdiction to award damages, Lord Hodge’s prima face view was that he was entitled to do so as the solicitors to both parties had signed an application to the chairman of RICS conferring a power to award damages. Also, by failing to raise any objections to the claims in the first three years of the arbitration, the parties had impliedly consented to confer on the arbiter the power to award damages.

 The full judgement of the Scottish courts is available here.

(See also related decision here.)

All of our property and conveyancing case summaries are contained in the LKS Property and Conveyancing Casebook here.

Inner House case relating to the sale of a house and garden in Alloway.  The seller, Mr McSorley also owned a small additional plot of land nearby, which was not part of the sale agreement.  However, the disposition mistakenly included the extra plot of land with neither solicitor noticing the error. A year later, the Drennans (the purchasers) sold on the entire estate to a third party, who asserted ownership of the additional plot.

Mr McSorley claimed damages from the Drennans on the basis that they knowingly sold property not belonging to them and that, as a third party had acquired the land in good faith, reduction of the disposition and rectification of the Land Register were not available. The sheriff and temporary sheriff principal accepted this argument and allowed a proof on the level of damages. However, on appeal, the Inner House recalled the sheriff court decisions and dismissed the action finding that a remedy of damages would be available where there was a breach of contract or breach of a delictual obligation. However, Mr McSorley’s pleadings had not contained arguments to that effect.

The Inner House also rejected the notion that purchasers like the Drennans must be deemed to be aware of the technical details of dispositions noting that, in any case dependent on allegations of deliberate and dishonest wrongdoing, it was essential for a pursuer to make specific and pointed arguments in that regard.

It was noted briefly that Mr McSorley may yet be able to pursue a remedy based on reduction of the deeds despite the third party purchase or that remedies based in unjustified enrichment or delict may also be available to him.

The full judgement of the Scottish courts is available here.

All of our property and conveyancing case summaries are contained in the LKS Property and Conveyancing Casebook here.

Good morning everyone. 

Firstly I would like to thank everyone for attending the Annual General Meeting of the Scottish Borders Chamber of Commerce.  I am James Aitken and I am the Convener of the Chamber.   I will make further introductions as we go along.    

The order of events this morning is fairly straightforward.  I will talk about what has been happening in the Chamber over the past year and also a few other thoughts.  You will no doubt be relieved to hear I only intend to speak for 10 minutes or so.  I will then see if anyone has any questions. 

I will then ask Craig Little, the Chamber’s Treasurer, to give a review of our financial situation.  I understand that Craig has brought a number of copies of our accounts for anyone who would like a copy.

Then I will ask the other Directors if they would like to give a quick update on their respective business sectors. 

I will then invite any final questions from the floor.   

We should be finished the formal part of the AGM by around 9:15.  Please stay on if you can. 

So to the Chamber and the past year. 

The past year has seen the appointment of almost a completely new Board of Directors including myself as Convener.   

One of the first things the new Board did was to undertake a complete review of how the Chamber operates.  I will come back to this in a minute or so. 

In addition, and more importantly in my opinion, the Board asked themselves the following question:  is there still a need for a Scottish Borders Chamber of Commerce?  After lengthy discussions over a number of months, a majority of the Board said yes.  There was though a number of caveats.  These included that we must be financially viable, we must not be reliant on external funding, we must not be just another talking shop or “boys” club.  The Board also agreed to ask itself the same question at the end of this year.  I am pleased to report that progress is being made on these caveats.                    

Now to the day to day running of the Chamber.

Our finances are now in a much improved state.  However, to get to this position the Board, like many other businesses, has had to take some hard decisions in the past year to reduce our overheads.  That included the Board having to make a valued employee redundant.   In fact our sole employee.  This has meant an increased workload for the Directors. 

The Board also agreed to freeze our membership rates for this and the following year and to offer a discount for members rejoining within a month of the start of our new financial year.  As the Chamber no longer receives any external funding, and will not in fact seek further external funding, the Chamber is now almost entirely dependent on membership income.   Craig will cover our finances in more detail in a few minutes and will answer any questions you may have.

The Board has also had to deal with a number of problematic historical issues.    I am again glad to report that progress has been made on all of these historical issues and in particular the Border Works issue.   

The Board discussions have also resulted in a series of changes and improvements to the way we operate.    This is of course a work in progress and a great deal still needs to be done.    

Tne major change concerned communications and the appointment of a consultant, Harry McGrath, to deal with this vitally important task on our behalf.  Harry deals with both internal, our members, and external, the press to give an example, communications. 

This has included a new website which is regularly updated, regular emails to our members, a much improved twitter presence and more press releases.  The feedback we have received to date on these changes has been very positive. 

Other matters which we are still working on include membership, appointment of new Directors and events. 

On membership we are to begin a membership drive in August. 

As for Directors, a number of new Directors have already been appointed.  This is obviously an ongoing process.  I also intend to create an association of former Directors of the Chamber.  The advantages to the Chamber of keeping in touch with former Directors are obvious.    

On events Jim Mather, former Scottish Government Enterprise, Energy and Tourism Minister, and Alyn Smyth a Scottish Member of the European Parliament who has a particular interest in agricultural matters, have agreed to speak at events to be held in October and November respectively.   A third winter event involving Craig Little will be announced shortly. 

We are also considering holding a networking event every 2 months or so.  This is something we are going to ask our members for their views on in the next week or so. 

The review that the Board has undertaken would not be of much use if we had only looked at internal Chamber matters. 

A great deal of time has been spent considering our relationship with various bodies such as the Scottish Chambers of Commerce, neighbouring Chambers and other local business organisations, Scottish Borders Council and our local politicians.

Can I take this opportunity to thank Ged Cowans for his work with the Scottish Chambers on behalf of the Board.

Shortly after becoming Convener, Ged and I held a number of meetings with our neighbouring Chambers in the Lothians.  These Chambers were considering a merger and asked us if we also wanted to become part of a larger Chamber. 

One of the reasons why the Board unanimously rejected a merger was the amount of time taking up discussing the “City regions” policy.  I made the position of our Chamber clear.  Of course we want to work closely with our neighbouring Chambers, however, although we agree that Edinburgh is important to the Borders our links with Dumfries and Galloway and Northumberland are just as important to us. 

The Board’s position on this is straightforward.  The Borders needs a business organisation or even organisations whose priority is to represent the interests of the Borders business community.

Now to Scottish Borders Council and in particular its economic development department. 

To be clear I have not been impressed and I have made this clear to those I have dealt with.  The Chamber does not see its role to simply provide a token representative from the business community to the latest talking shop being mooted or document to sign in front of the press.   

That said, it is only a few weeks since the local elections were held.   It was clear from reading the various manifestos that each party and many of those standing as independents, see the economy as a priority.  That as far as we are concerned means a fresh start. 

I have already had a very constructive telephone conversation with Stuart Bell, the councillor now in charge of economic development.  I am meeting Stuart again in the next week or so and he has agreed to come and speak at our August Board meeting.   

I have also made it clear to Stuart that the Chamber will continue to campaign for a forum for all business organisations in the Borders.  You may be surprised to know that there are almost 50 such organisations in the Borders.  Instead of wasting time and effort trying to get these bodies to merge let’s try a different approach.   Let’s acknowledge and celebrate the fact that so many people are willing to try and help business flourish in the Borders.  I will continue to press on this.

Every politician I have met or spoken to is in favour of the idea of this forum.

That brings me nicely on to our meetings with our local politicians.

So far we have met or spoken to Michael Moore, Chic Brodie, John Lamont, Christine Grahame and a number of councillors including David Parker.  Other meetings are planned.   One interesting idea that arose from these meetings was the idea of MSPs holding surgeries specifically for businesses.   Another was arranging a meeting of all the South of Scotland Chambers.

A couple of final points. 

Let’s not forget that there are many great things going on in the Borders just now.  Eyemouth Harbour can now receive cruise ships, our first crematorium is now in operation, a second is almost complete, the Borders Book Festival, the Border Union Show, the new 3G Arena in Gala, mountain biking at Glentress, our common ridings.  I could go on and on.   

Then there is the return of our railway that should never have been taken away in the first place.  This is a fantastic opportunity for the business community in the Borders.  Let’s ensure that we fully realise its potential.   That includes making sure that Twedbank is not the final stop on this line.      

I would also like to take this opportunity to thank my fellow Directors, both past and present, for their continued support and all their hard work over the past year.  Our Directors do not even claim expenses.  In particular I would like to thank Fiona Drane, my predecessor as Convener, and Sally Scott-Aiton our former employee, for all the time and effort they put in to the Chamber. I would also like to thank Gordon and Kate for accommodating us today. 

Lastly, and by no means least, I would like to thank our members for their continued support.

The Scottish Government consultation can be found here.  The consultation paper seeks views on the Scottish Government’s proposals for a Land and Buildings Transaction Tax for Scotland to replace the current UK Stamp Duty Land Tax from April 2015.

This is important as it is effectively the beginning of a Scottish tax system.  

The consultation is also of a standard that we will now expect.   Previsous papers on corporation tax and excise duty, although not consultations, were simply not good enough.  Lessons clearly have been learned. 

The consultation ends on 30 August 2012. 

The weekend before last was supposed to play host to one of the biggest electronic music events in the UK, Baselogic Productions’ Bloc Festival. Following 6 successful annual events and despite a move from Butlins holiday park to the London ‘Pleasure Gardens’ the festival sold almost 15,600 tickets out of a capacity of 18,000. Replete with techno godfathers Richie Hawtin and Carl Craig it looked set to be the event of the summer.  However, it was not to be.

The chosen site in central London, which saw the festival spread out over venues including a ship moored at the Royal Victoria docks, was not equipped to handle the crowd capacity, with most punters spending the first evening queuing rather than watching any bands and those who entered the separate venues not being able to leave due to too few exits.  Ticketing was handled by the unfortunately named ‘Crowdsurge’, who maintain the site was under capacity The plug was pulled at 12:45am Saturday morning, with 15,000 festival-goers informed that the remainder of the festival was cancelled.

Interestingly, as the dust has settled, BP have gone into administration. Unable to honour their debts to the artists due to the obligation to refund 15,600 tickets, BP find themselves in a position not faced by any other festival organiser before in the UK.  After a mere 2 weeks of lectures on the Glasgow University LLB course on corporate administration, this raised more questions than I can find answers to, from a legal perspective, given how different a festival organisers business is compared to a company that trades all year round. At face value, if they are obliged to refund all tickets for the events, this would mean their liabilities (artist payments for the artists who either played Friday night or were in London prepared to play their time slot) exceed their assets, so administration would be unavoidable. But even trying to organise thoughts on the consequences into a logical order is proving impossible, almost as hard as trying to fathom why so many people like techno….

How does a ‘festival’ trade throughout the year?
How are the administrators, appointed under the Insolvency Act 1986, going to continue trading as BP? Administrators are tasked with rescuing the company as an ongoing concern, but BP only host one event a year. A festival organiser such as All Tomorrow’s Parties host events worldwide every couple of months and have a steady stream of revenue all year long, whereas bloc presumably take in ticket sales in advance of the festival and a percentage of catering /onsite entertainment/drinks/merchandise sales for only one weekend of the year.  The amount that currently remains from the proceeds of ticket sales will depend on money already expended on upfront costs – venue rent, live music and alcohol permits, flights for performers (which some insist on in advance) and other attendant costs of putting on a festival. Assuming they have the credit facilities to last until a new festival can be organised, how will BP be able to put on another festival successful enough to recoup the money lost on the 2012 fiasco and cover the costs of the make-up festival?  Do the electronic artists that travel from all over the globe have enough solidarity with the genre and festival that they will perform out of charity? How will BP convince administrators that this could even be accomplished? Do they have financial reserves built up from previous years?

How are ingoings and outgoings handled for a festival?
Organisation starts almost immediately after the end of the prior year’s festivals. Live event permits have to be paid upfront as do the costs for renting the venues.  Organisers must take a wage, either monthly or following the completion of accounts for the previous festival. The online records available for BP’s financial year ending 31/3/2011 put ‘cash at bank’ (the same value as ‘total assets’) at £167,636 and their ‘total liabilities’ at £140,886. In short, BP look roughly £27,000 in the red.  Bloc 2011 took place on the weekend accounts were filed. Whether this means all bands fees are paid out of ticket sales prior to the festival commencing and all other percentage cuts are handled after the festival, I don’t know. This puts BPs theoretical reserves at £27,000. As a small festival, it would stand to reason that BP as a private limited company lease rather than own, which would explain why total assets are the same as cash assets in their accounts. Suffice to say, their reserves do not look substantial.

Do the festival attendees and performers both rank as unsecured creditors?
BP have not announced how ticket refunds will be handled, but affirmed that they will be. Is the consequence of administration that festival goers rank as unsecured creditors?  If so, where will they rank? There are also the performers (that actually performed, those who found out about the cancellation may have been able to mitigate their losses and avoid unnecessary travel and expense) and security staff (provided by agencies).  And before this, the administrators fees have to now be satisfied, which as witnessed in the ongoing Rangers administration case can reach up to £130 per hour per administrator.  Someone has to lose out.  The bulk of the costs will be non-recoverable: permits, venue rent, alcohol licenses etc. If ticket sales went to satisfying those costs, where will refund money for 15,800 disappointed festival-goers come from? It doesn’t exist anymore, which suggests Bloc’s audience will bear the brunt of the affair. Festivals thrive on reputation and regular annual attendees, which Bloc had up until this weekend.  The shame of it is that with the disappearance of Glade festival and Barcelona’s Sonar being a more expensive affair, Bloc has always represented an excellent festival for a cheap ticket price. It begs the question, how could something as fundamental as crowd capacity and control be handled so terribly in the festival preparation?

UPDATE: – Since starting this blog, The Guardian has revealed that BP have gone into voluntary liquidation.  Sean Michaels reports that BP’s assets are going to be sapped by liquidators fees and claims of other creditors. Refunds for ticket-holders look increasingly unlikely, but I can’t imagine 15,800 ticket holders are going to techno for an answer….

Inner House case in which Ms Kirkham sought damages from her Landlords after she tripped and fell over uneven paving slabs on her garden path. She relied both on the terms of her lease and the Occupiers Liability (Scotland) Act 1960. The claim had been rejected in the Outer House and was appealed to the Inner House.

Lease
In terms of the lease, Link undertook to:

1. Clause 5.3
   “carry out all repairs within a reasonable period of becoming aware that repairs need to be done”
2. Clause 5.4
   “carry out inspections, at reasonable intervals, of the common parts”.
3. Clause 5.8
   “keep in repair the structure and exterior of the house, including … pathways, steps or other means of access …”

 Taking each of the clauses in turn the Inner house agreed with the findings of the Outer House:

1. Clause 5.3 did not come into play unless Link was made aware of a repair requiring to be done (which had not been done). Also, on a proper construction of the clause, Ms Kirkham could not rely upon deemed knowledge.
2. Ms Kirkham’s garden path was not a common part. It was not a “common facility” shared by other tenants or residents, but rather was a dedicated access to Ms Kirkham’s property.
3. Clause 5.8 did not impose any repair obligation over and above what was to be found elsewhere in the tenancy agreement or in statute. The words “take reasonable care” did not require to be read into the clause so that there could be argued to be a breach of a duty to take reasonable care by failing to inspect the pathway regularly.

Occupiers Liability
In terms of sections 2 and 3 of the 1960 Act, Ms Kirkham was entitled to such care as, in all the circumstances of the case, was reasonable to ensure that she would not suffer injury or damage by reason of danger arising from the state of the premises. In order to succeed, Ms Kirkham would have had to establish Link’s failure to take reasonable care for her safety.  For example, she would require to show a failure to set up an adequate system of inspection, or failure to properly implement a system of inspection which was already in place.

However, in this case Mrs Kirkham failed to provide evidence as to what other landlords in the same situation as Link did by way of periodic inspection. Therefore it was not apparent what Link required to do in relation to the footpath. On the evidence available, it had not been established that the system undertaken was inadequate.

The full judgement is available from Scottish Courts here.

All of our property and conveyancing case summaries are contained in the LKS Property and Conveyancing Casebook here.

Sheriff Court case considering an alleged servitude right of access to a site for development on Dundee Road in West Ferry.  Harton Homes argued that a servitude right of access had been created by implication which led from their site to Dundee Road over the southern portion of a neighbouring property owned by Mrs Durk and through a gap in a wall which separating both properties from the road.

Both Harton’s property and Mrs Durk’s property had previously formed part of larger subjects owned by Mr and Mrs Callison who split the subjects in 1985 and sold parts to Harton’s and Mrs Durkin’s predecessors in title. The break off dispositions conveying these parts made no reference to a  servitude right of access. However, the route over which Harton claimed the servitude had been created by implication had been marked as “mutual” on the plans attached to the break off dispositions.

A servitude can arise by implication on such a division of property where it is reasonably necessary for the comfortable use and enjoyment of one of the resulting parts. However, Mrs Durk argued that there were other potential alternative means of access which could be taken from the north of the properties. Potential access routes existed from Ellislea Road (situated to the east of both subjects and perpendicular to Dundee Road) or via another looping access road from Dundee Road meaning that there was arguably no necessity to imply a servitude over Mrs Durk’s property. These routes were probably not as attractive to Harton as they were less convenient and their gradient and the presence of a narrow archway made them unsuitable for construction traffic.  Although the Callisons’ title to the larger subjects made reference to rights to use the alternative access ways, Harton argued that that these rights did not extend to their part of the property (suggesting that the rights stopped short of their property, or had been abandoned and that the use by them of the rights would illegally increase the burden on the servient property).

The main thrust of Harton’s argument  was based on there being a “common intention” among the parties’ predecessors in title in 1984/5 (about the time the larger property was split) that access for both properties be taken over Mrs Durk’s property. The sheriff noted that, while common intention may be relevant as potentially throwing light on whether the parties considered the access to be necessary at the time of severance, it could not per se be a distinct ground for setting up an implied servitude. In any event the sheriff found himself unable to conclude that there was a common intention that the access right Harton argued for be granted. At best there had been an anticipation that the access would be available in 1984 when an application for outline planning permission for houses on each of the properties was submitted. Further, although later planning applications in respect of services to the plots showed the access located clearly on Mrs Durk’s property, initial planning applications for houses had shown the access located centrally. Harton could also have created a gap in the wall to the south of their property (similar to that in Mrs Durk’s property), the sheriff noting that there was no evidence of a title impediment and insufficient evidence of any planning impediment to do so. (However, evidence suggested that Harton may not have wished to create another gap in the wall as the gap situated on Mrs Durk’s property was more convenient and allowed for turning.)

After considering the evidence, the sheriff was not persuaded that there were physical difficulties or title impediments which prevented use of an alternative means of access to Harton’s property. In all the circumstances, Harton had failed to prove that the servitude through Mrs Durk’s property was reasonably necessary for the comfortable enjoyment of their property.

The full judgement is available from Scottish Courts here.

All of our property and conveyancing case summaries are contained in the LKS Property and Conveyancing Casebook here.

Where to start?  I think I will start with the Scottish Futures Trust.  I remember well the negative reaction to the SFT when it was first proposed.  The coverage the SFT has received this week shows how much things have changed.  The fact that the long term costs of PFI are now widely known also shows how good an idea the SFT was.  A report on this from the BBC news website can be found here.

This raises another issue.  Notwithstanding the fiscal powers debate it is clear Scotland is increasingly doing things its own way.  On areas such as health or education the differences are well documented.  Now Scotland is to have its own food standards agency and a new governing body for the Scottish canals.  This is not because of Calman or the Scotland Act but because of the actions of the UK Government.  Add to this the Revenue Scotland announcement and you see the direction in which things are moving.

Now to a subject I have written about before, the Crown Estate.  It is now difficult to find someone against devolving control over the Crown Estate in Scotland to the Scottish Parliament other than the present UK Government.  If the UK Government is not even willing to cede control over this body to the Scottish Parliament then it is easy to accuse them of not seriously engaging in the fiscal powers debate.  A report on the latest ploy by the UK Government to not devolve control of the Crown Estate to the Scottish Parliament can be found here.

Now to the UK Government’s so called “Heritage tax”.  “The Heritage Alliance is disappointed that the UK Government has refused – despite widespread opposition and strong challenges to the rigour of its evidence base – to reconsider its Budget proposal to remove zero rating of VAT on approved alterations to listed buildings.”  No sign yet of a u-turn on this proposal.  More on this can be found here.

The Sunday Times recently reported that Scottish Government advisor Dr Andrew Cameron has advised that a tax break, which would allow wealthy landowners and investors to plant trees in exchange for tax offsets, would help Scotland meet its forest coverage goals. That would of course require further tax powers to be devolved if this was to be just a Scottish tax relief.  Let’s also not forget that the last attempt at something like this was a complete shambles.  Hopefully if this idea is revisited lessons will have been learned.  A story on this issue from 2002 can be found here.

Now to the “shared services” debate.  The House of Commons Public Accounts Committee has found that a Whitehall scheme to share resources across departments has cost hundreds of millions of pounds more than it saved.  The scheme ran £500 million over budget, costing £1.4 billion, and of the five departments that took part, only one broke even.  A report on this from the Telegraph can be found here.  Sadly I am not surprised with this report.

Aggregates Levy is one of two other miscellaneous taxes recommended for devolving to the Scottish Parliament under the Calman Commission.  The other being Air Passenger Duty.  The UK Government has so far resisted devolving Aggregates Levy due to a European Court action by the British Aggregates Association.  An update on this from HMRC can be found here.  The UK Government are fast running out of excuses for not devolving Aggregates Levy.

I was not surprised to read that many elderly farmers are working long past retirement age because they fear losing agricultural property relief (APR).  APR is likely to reduce their liability to inheritance tax.  Their worries have been prompted by HMRC’s tactics of challenging APR on farmhouses at every opportunity.  A report on this from the STEP journal can be found here.

Now to matters slightly further afield.

The European Commission’s Brussels IV proposal to simplify the settlement of international successions has received the final backing of the European Union’s Council of Justice Ministers.  The regulation will come into force in 2015 and will apply directly in all member states, other than Denmark and the opting-out members UK and Ireland.  Hopefully this is something that the UK and Ireland will consider again in the near future.  A report on this from the European Commission can be found here.

Now to France.  As expected, France’s new Socialist government has announced a series of increases in personal and business taxation.  They include new wealth taxes and a tax on foreign owners of holiday homes.  A similar idea was floated last year by the Sarkozy administration but it was dropped when the French Government was advised that such a tax would not survive a challenge under European Union anti-discrimination legislation. Hollande may believe he can avoid this by calling the levy a “social charge” rather than a tax.  A report on this from the STEP journal can be found here.

The New York Times has published an article describing just how easy it is to set up a Delaware shell company without disclosing its beneficial ownership.  This is something that the US Government has regularly pilloried many other countries for.  Apparently Delaware has more corporate entities than people.  The article from the New York Times can be found here.

A Berkshire man has been convicted of evading £430,000 inheritance tax on a Swiss bank account he held jointly with his mother.  HMRC obtained Michael Shanly’s account details from the French authorities, who had bought them from a former employee of HSBC Geneva, who had stolen them from the bank.  This is a good example of the increasing co-operation between European countries and the increasing effectiveness of HMRC.  A report on this from the BBC news website can be found here.

Australia has introduced its highly controversial carbon tax, after years of bitter political wrangling.  The law forces about 300 of the worst-polluting firms to pay a A$23 (£15; $24) levy for every tonne of greenhouse gases they produce.  The Australian Government says the tax is needed to meet climate-change obligations of Australia – the highest emitter per-head in the developed world.  A report on this from the BBC news website can be found here.  The environmental taxation debate in the UK, in contrast, has slipped down the political agenda over the last few years.

I think I will end with Cyprus.  The Cyprus government will not agree to cut its 10% corporation tax rate in order to secure a European rescue of its banking sector and public finances.  Cyprus may though have to agree to a further VAT increase as part of these negotiations.  Cyprus is taking a similar stance to the one taken by Ireland over the last couple of years.  A report on this can be found here.

Have a good weekend.

Two new Scottish statutory instruments have been published which make changes to the EPC regime in order to transpose provisions of Directive 2010/31/EU (relating to Energy Performance Certificates) into Scots law.  The provisions  come into effect on 1 October 2012  and  9 January 2013.

You can see a note of the main changes here.

When someone dies, there can often be a number of government departments and agencies to notify.  For example, a passport or driving licence may need to be cancelled, or benefits stopped.  The “Tell Us Once” service is designed to make things simpler for you, by helping you give this information to government only once.

Once you have registered the death, the registrar will tell you about your options for using Tell Us Once.  These are:

• in person, by making an appointment with your local authority bereavement adviser
• by phone – the registrar will give you the phone number
• online

After you have used the Tell Us Once service, the relevant government departments and services will be contacted on your behalf.  Depending on your circumstances these may include:

• Adult Services (social care for adults)
• Children’s Services
• Council Housing
• Council Tax Office
• Disability and Carers Service
• DVLA (driving licence agency)
• HM Revenue and Customs (for Child Benefit, Tax Credits and personal taxation)
• Passport Service
• Pension Service

The information you give to the adviser is only passed on to the government departments that need to know.

More on this can be found here.