A few days ago a vitally important judgment was released concerning (once again) the matter of Liability Order 'costs'. This particular case was an appeal and was heard in the High Court but unlike in the recent case of the Reverend Nicolson, this particular local authority (East Northamptonshire District Council) had prepared a schedule of standardised costs of the type encouraged by Judge Andrews in the Reverend's case (paragraph 46). The claimant; Edward Williams represented himself and his appeal concerned (amongst other points) the following: One: That the summons served was an abuse of process because within it, it included an amount of costs (£75). He contended that the Regulations make no provision for the summons to include an amount by way of costs and that costs could only become due once, and if, a liability order were made Two: That including the amount of costs on the face of the summons was an abuse because it was an unlawful demand for money which the local authority had no right to make at that time. He contended that the costs were not due and owing at the date of the summons . He pointed out that the complaint on which the summons was based made no reference to the costs of £75. He submitted that it was an unfair manipulation of the Court process to include an amount for costs on the face of the summons, particularly when the only real summons cost was £3. He suggested that the recipient of a summons would be misled into believing that the costs of £75 were fixed and could not be debated or challenged. Three: He wanted to appeal the earlier decision regarding the sum of £75 and whether the costs had been 'reasonably incurred'. Most importantly; (and this is of significance to all local authorities who had been waiting for this case to be heard), Mr Williams considered that when compiling a schedule of costs, East Northamptonshire Council were wrong to include figures for: Information and Technology costs. Chip and Pin costs. Pension deficit funding.

In figures just released, it was found that NHS Trusts have run a deficit of £1 billion in just 3 months. The government have increased funding in the NHS, but not related to healthcare inflation or taking into account the increased numbers using the NHS. Hospitals are having to pay a fortune for agency Nurses, because they can't get enough. Within one NHS Trust in the London area, they have 1600 vacancies across different job roles. Yet the government have a policy from 2016 to remove from the UK foreign workers who have not reached £35k per year in 5 years of being here. This will include many non EU Nurses. Meanwhile government will fund HS2 at the cost of £40+ billion and Trident replacement at £100 billion. Surely time has come to prioritise spending on essential services and infrastructure. NHS, Housing, basic transport network, schools. I am not convinced of any long term plan and it is being made up as they go along. Has been the case with successive governments over a long period. The UK has a golden opportunity to use rising population through immigration and record low interest rates, to invest in the infrastructure the country needs. The IMF and leading economists have said that UK government should be investing for future prosperity. Instead the current government are relying on mostly foreign investment which will come at a price and profits will end up going abroad.

Hi there, I've worked as a sales assistant for a small family firm for ten years. Last Friday my boss said he could not pay my full wages as he was having financial problems, i.e. paying suppliers for goods received. I'd like to know if he is within his rights to do this without my consent.