Congress has passed much-anticipated legislation providing
funding relief for pension plan sponsors. The Preservation of
Access to Care for Medicare Beneficiaries and Pension Relief Act of
2010 (the "Act") was signed by President Obama and became
law on June 25, 2010. The Act also provides limited relief relating
to funding-based benefit restrictions imposed on underfunded
plans.
As the title of the Act suggests, the pension changes were
included with provisions relating to the Medicare program. While
pension funding relief had been debated in Congress for some time,
it finally passed when it was paired with the deferral of the
reduction in payments to Medicare providers....
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vendor's silence in relation to contamination may not always constitute misleading or deceptive conduct. The recent NSW Supreme Court decision in Vitek v Estate Homes Pty Ltd [2010] NSWSC 237 (Vitek) confirms that silence will be misleading or deceptive only if what was said and the context in which it occurred gives rise to a reasonable expectation of disclosure.
As Dr. Seuss once famously wrote (Marvin K. Mooney, Will You Please Go Now), "THE TIME HAS COME, THE TIME IS NOW". Good faith efforts to bargain with Chapter 9 of the Bankruptcy Code in the foreground must begin now if we want to emerge from this financial crisis.
Employers in all industries should be aware that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration ("OSHA") of the United States Department of Labor has recently undertaken several new initiatives, including a Severe Violators Enforcement Program (SVEP), and that Congress is considering an enhancement to OSHA's workplace safety requirements by the proposed Protecting America's Workers Act.
On July 20, 2010, the Minnesota Court of Appeals issued a decision that clarifies the standard for determining whether certain workers are properly classified as employees or independent contractors.
The National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) recently published proposed rules intended to bar financially troubled federally insured credit unions from providing golden parachute payments to executives terminating employment and all federally insured credit unions from making certain prohibited indemnification payments.
A recent decision of the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal, "Johnstone v. Canada Border Services", looks at an employer's obligation to accommodate an employee's request for alternate working arrangements to allow the employee to meet his or her childcare obligations.
On July 23, 2010, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) released new regulations, under title II and title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), on accessibility for public entities and places of public accommodation.
An update on the recent statistics published by NERA, the employment law watchdog tasked with ensuring that employers comply with their employment law obligations.
The Department of Labor (DOL) has issued new rules requiring disclosure of information in connection with services provided to ERISA-covered employee benefit plans.
The Department of Labor ("DOL") issued a fact sheet in July 2010 to aid employers in complying with the recent federal law that requires employers to (1) provide reasonable break times to express breast milk, and (2) provide a private location to express breast milk.
