A review of law reform in 2024

Rachael Irvine, Scottish Law Commission

The Scottish Law Commission has had another busy year progressing its Eleventh Programme of Law Reform. As 2024 comes to a close, there are many highlights and achievements to reflect upon.

Publications

In early December, the Commission published its Report on Damages for Personal Injury. The reforms recommended in the Report focus on damages for services, deductions from damages, provisional damages and asbestos-related disease, and management of children’s awards of damages. They seek to modernise the law and clarify certain areas causing difficulty, ultimately achieving greater fairness in the context of awards of damages for personal injury in Scotland. The Commission is grateful for the engaged response that its recommendations have already received from personal injury practitioners, and hope that those recommendations will be taken forward in a new Damages (Scotland) Bill.

This particular achievement has concluded a year which saw a succession of publications across a number of projects. In the Spring, the Commission published its Discussion Paper on Tenement law: compulsory owners’ associations. This was followed closely by its Discussion Paper on the Tenancy of Shops (Scotland) Act 1949. More recently, in the Autumn, the Commission published its  Discussion Paper on Civil Remedies for Domestic Abuse. The Commission is looking forward to advancing these projects further in the New Year. For more detail on what is in the pipeline, please read the companion article: “Looking Ahead to 2025”.

Commission appointments

The Commission welcomed a number of new faces throughout the year.

In its Spring e-Bulletin, the Commission announced the appointment of Ann Stewart as a part-time Commissioner. She is currently leading the new project on Execution of documents. Ann has a welcome mix of practitioner and research experience which, together with her many current roles in the property and conveyancing sector, will be of great assistance to the project. Her team are currently assembling an Advisory Group with expertise and interest in this area of law. Work on drafting a Discussion Paper will begin in early 2025.  

The Commission was also delighted that Professor Frankie McCarthy was re-appointed as a Commissioner until 30 September 2027. The appointment was announced by the Minister for Victims and Community Safety, Siobhian Brown MSP, in July. Professor McCarthy is leading the Commission’s work on Heritable Securities and Tenement law: compulsory owners’ associations. The Commission continues to benefit from her specialist knowledge and experience in these matters.

Finally,  the Commission was pleased to be joined by its new Chief Executive, Rachel Rayner, in July. Rachel is a Scottish Government lawyer with extensive experience of every aspect of legislation, both primary and secondary.  Her previous involvement with many institutions instrumental in shaping the law of Scotland makes her a major asset to the Commission.

This year, the Commission also said goodbye to its 2023-2024 legal assistants and its interim Chief Executive, Charles Garland. Their hard work while in post was greatly appreciated. The new cohort of legal assistants started at the end of August and have settled in well to their project teams.

SLC Bills at Scottish Parliament

To round off such a successful year, the Commission was pleased to see former projects reaching important milestones.

The Judicial Factors (Scotland) Bill, based on a Commission report from 2013, was passed by the Scottish Parliament on 10 December 2024 and now awaits Royal Assent. A judicial factor is an officer appointed by the court to collect, hold and administer property in accordance with the relevant law, and all judicial factors are supervised by the Accountant of Court. The existing legislation, mainly dating from the 19^th century, is in need of modernisation and the Commission is proud of its work in updating and modernising the law to make it fit for the 21^st Century.

The Leases (Automatic Continuation etc) (Scotland) Bill was introduced in the Scottish Parliament on the 11 December 2024. This will implement recommendations made by the Commission in its 2022 Report on Aspects of Leases: Termination. These recommendations aim to modernise and clarify the law concerning leases which continue automatically past their termination date, and other procedural elements related to the termination of leases.

Over the summer, the Scottish Government consulted on the Commission’s Report on Review  of Contract Law: Formation, Interpretation, Remedies for Breach, and Penalty Clauses (published in 2018). The Commission welcomed this consultation as a helpful step forward, and it is hoped that this may lead to reform of contract law

The Commission is delighted to share these successes, and hopes that its Reports will continue to be  implemented in the years ahead.  

Written by Rachael Irvine, Legal Assistant on the Homicide law project