Practical Law

Imagine… you own a site. You give an option to a developer to buy that site subject to obtaining planning permission. It gets the planning permission, using planning drawings prepared by a firm of architects that it engages, but the option to buy the site lapses. You sell the site (which now comes with planning … Continue reading A refresher on copyright – Lennox Estates v S&W Ventures →

Increasingly, the construction industry model that we know so well – based on layers of contractors and sub-contractors – is being called into question. In the last six months various failures (including Grenfell, Scottish PFI-built schools and Carillion’s collapse) have prompted questions about construction industry outsourcing and transfer of risk. Queries have been raised about … Continue reading Payment, retention and risk: shuffling the deck →

A developer client of mine recently asked me about “guaranteed maximum price” contracts. He had heard mention of them, was keen to keep overspends on his project to a minimum and was under the impression that they would set the contract sum in stone. Thinking this sounded too good to be true, he asked me … Continue reading Guaranteed Maximum Price contracts: do they do what they say on the tin? →

Parties are often so concerned about getting the express terms of the contract right that they forget about implied terms. Following the Supreme Court decision in Marks and Spencer plc v BNP Paribas Securities Services Trust Company (Jersey) Ltd, this blog looks at some of the key statutory and common law terms which may be … Continue reading What lies beneath: a reminder of some key implied terms in construction contracts →