ONLINE EVENT: How to avoid risks in customer agreements and supply chains during Covid-19

The Chancellor confirmed that payments under the scheme would not be available immediately.

The Construction Leadership Council (with backing from the Government) has issued practical guidance and draft pro-forma documents to enable all parties involved in the construction supply chain to enter into collaborative and open dialogue about applications for extensions of time and additional payment and to minimise potential disputes. The guidance can we downloaded here

The draft letters and notices included in the guidance have been prepared on the basis of the standard JCT Design and Build 2016 and NEC 3/4 Engineering and Construction Contract (Option A) and parties will need to make sure that they are completed/adjusted to comply with their own specific contracts.

The Cabinet Office has also issued a general statement calling on parties to contracts adversely affected by C-19 to act responsibly and fairly and to support national efforts to protect jobs and the economy.

Conduct risk assessments! Your RA must cover every foreseeable risk arising from a return to the workplace, including the impact of reduced staff levels and any operational/administrative changes necessary to ensure social distancing.

Appropriate steps should be taken to manage and mitigate identified risks. Where this is not possible, businesses need to decide whether certain activities are necessary for the business to operate or if they can be temporarily put on hold.
Keep a close eye on the comprehensive Government guidance: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/working-safely-during-coronavirus-covid-19

In particular focus on social distancing and workplace health measures. This guidance will evolve over time and you will need to be sure that your organisation is sticking to it AND reviewing and updating its risk assessment.

If organisations don’t have a formal home working policy, then they should set out, as soon as possible, in clear terms, what is expected of employees from a data protection perspective when working from home. These might include:

• If someone is using their own device for remote working, ensuring that any devices that hold work-related information have up-to-date anti-virus software and that broadband connections have properly configured firewalls
• Reminding staff to contact the organisation’s IT department if they encounter any issues with home working, and not to try and resolve any issues themselves
• Reminding staff that they should notify relevant individuals within the organisation if they consider that there might have been a personal data breach. A breach will still be notifiable even if it does occur at home during the pandemic. These should be logged by the organisation in their data breach log in the normal way
• Ensuring staff lock their devices whenever they are not using them
• Where possible, working in a separate part of the home to family members
• Ensuring confidentiality of information – advising staff not to have phone calls where others are likely to hear the conversation. This might mean moving to a different room, closing the door, or arranging a call for a more convenient time. If employees have smart speakers, you may want to consider advising them to either turn these off, if they are working in the same room as it, or work in a different room
• Wherever possible, avoid taking hard copy documents home, and, if papers are taken home, never placing those papers in a bin or using a home shredder – any such papers should be shredded back at the office in the usual way
• Locking any papers in a safe place
• Not using social media platforms (unless already used and permitted by the organisation) to discuss work matters
• Advising extra caution with incoming emails as at times such as this there may be an increased risk of fraud, email hacking, spear phishing etc.
• Avoiding information being sent to personal email accounts (for example, so it can then be printed at home)
• Reminding staff of your organisation’s Information Security policies, procedures and protocols. These could be emailed to all staff working from home or they could be directed to such documents on the organisation’s intranet, for example

Organisations should also ensure that their remote access systems can cope with increased demand.

Whilst the ICO appreciates the unprecedented nature of this pandemic, it does not mean that organisations can forget about their obligations as controllers of personal data. If a major data security breach were to happen, there is still the possibility of enforcement action where the organisation didn’t put in place good risk mitigation measures.

We have a specialist team of data protection lawyers here at Ward Hadaway, and would be happy to discuss any data protection concerns or issues that you might have.

The Government has introduced new regulations, which took effect on 14 May 2020, to relax the publicity requirements in respect of planning applications.

Planning applications are usually required to be publicised by way of site notices and local newspaper notices and applications are to be made available for public inspection. The Government has recognised that these actions may not always be possible in accordance with social distancing guidelines and in order that Councils do not delay applications as a result of an inability to comply with the publicity requirements, the Government has relaxed the requirements.

A Local Planning Authority is now required to “take reasonable steps” to publicise a planning application, which may be through use of online newspapers, social media, or other electronic measures. What is considered reasonable will depend upon the circumstances of an individual application and will be proportionate to the scale and impact of the development. A large development that has previously generated significant interest will require more steps to bring the application to the attention of all of those with an interest than a householder application. The guidance emphasises the role of the publicity requirements, namely to enable those with an interest to make representations and to effectively participate in the decision making process and therefore community engagement remains key. It is recommended that the officer’s report refers to the steps taken where a Council has relied upon the temporary publicity arrangements.

The requirement to make planning applications available for public inspection has also been temporarily suspended providing that the applications are available for online inspection. In reality most LPAs already provide such an online facility. Where individuals are unable to access an application online LPAs should make alternative arrangements, for example providing information over the phone or providing a hard copy set of documents by post.

The regulations however only amend the statutory publicity requirements. In addition to these, all LPAs are required to have a Statement of Community Involvement which may provide for additional publicity requirements and the LPA will be bound by these regardless of the temporary relaxation of any statutory requirements. Where a Statement of Community Involvement does go beyond the statutory requirements, the Government guidance suggests that LPAs update these to ensure that local communities can continue to be consulted in the current climate.

The regulations are currently due to expire on 31 December 2020.