legalis-uk

United Kingdom Jurisdiction Support for Legalis-RS

Overview

legalis-uk provides comprehensive support for the UK legal system within the Legalis-RS framework, covering employment law, data protection, consumer rights, contract law, and company law for England and Wales.

Features

Employment Law (Employment Rights Act 1996)

Implementation of core UK employment rights and protections:

• ERA 1996 s.1 - Written particulars of employment
• ERA 1996 s.86 - Statutory notice periods
• ERA 1996 s.98 - Unfair dismissal (2-year qualifying period)
• ERA 1996 s.162 - Redundancy payment calculation
• Working Time Regulations 1998 - 48-hour week, rest breaks
• National Minimum Wage Act 1998 - Age-based wage rates

use legalis_uk::employment::{EmploymentContract, ContractType, validate_employment_contract};
use chrono::NaiveDate;

let contract = EmploymentContract::builder()
    .with_employee_name("John Smith")
    .with_employer_name("Acme Ltd")
    .with_contract_type(ContractType::Permanent)
    .with_start_date(NaiveDate::from_ymd_opt(2024, 1, 1).unwrap())
    .with_written_particulars(true);

match validate_employment_contract(&contract) {
    Ok(()) => println!("Contract complies with ERA 1996"),
    Err(e) => println!("Contract non-compliant: {}", e),
}

Data Protection (UK GDPR / Data Protection Act 2018)

UK GDPR implementation with 80% reuse from EU GDPR plus UK-specific adaptations:

• Article 6 - Lawfulness of processing (identical to EU)
• Article 9 - Special categories processing (identical to EU)
• Articles 15-22 - Data subject rights (identical to EU)
• Article 32 - Security of processing (identical to EU)
• UK-specific: ICO enforcement, UK adequacy decisions, DPA 2018 exemptions

use legalis_uk::data_protection::{
    // Re-exported from EU GDPR
    DataProcessing, LawfulBasis,
    // UK-specific
    IcoEnforcement, UkAdequacyDecision,
};

// Use EU GDPR types directly
let processing = DataProcessing::new()
    .with_lawful_basis(LawfulBasis::Consent { /* ... */ });

// UK-specific enforcement
let ico_action = IcoEnforcement::information_notice(/* ... */);

Consumer Rights (Consumer Rights Act 2015)

CRA 2015 implementation with tiered remedies for goods, services, and digital content:

• CRA s.9-11 - Goods: satisfactory quality, fit for purpose, as described
• CRA s.49-52 - Services: reasonable care and skill, price, time
• CRA s.34-47 - Digital content rights
• CRA s.22-24 - Tiered remedies (short-term reject → repair/replace → price reduction/final reject)
• CRA Part 2 - Unfair terms test

use legalis_uk::consumer_rights::{GoodsContract, Remedy, calculate_available_remedies};

let contract = GoodsContract::new("Laptop")
    .with_price(1299.99)
    .with_delivery_date(30.days_ago())
    .breach_discovered_on(10.days_ago());

let remedies = calculate_available_remedies(&contract)?;
// Returns: ShortTermRightToReject (within 30 days) or tiered remedies

Contract Law (Common Law Principles)

Common law contract formation with case law integration:

• Formation: Offer, acceptance, consideration, intention
• Mirror image rule - Counter-offer destroys original offer (Hyde v Wrench 1840)
• Postal rule - Acceptance complete on posting (Adams v Lindsell 1818)
• Consideration - Must move from promisee, not past (Tweddle v Atkinson 1861)
• Damages - Hadley v Baxendale test (1854)
• Terms - Condition, warranty, innominate term (Hong Kong Fir Shipping 1962)

use legalis_uk::contract::{
    ContractFormation, Offer, Acceptance, Consideration,
    validate_contract_formation,
};

let formation = ContractFormation::new()
    .with_offer(Offer::new("Sale of goods for £100"))
    .with_acceptance(Acceptance::unqualified("I accept"))
    .with_consideration(Consideration::money(100.0))
    .with_commercial_intention(true);

match validate_contract_formation(&formation) {
    Ok(_) => println!("Valid contract formed"),
    Err(e) => println!("Contract invalid: {}", e),
}

Company Law (Companies Act 2006)

CA 2006 implementation for company formation and governance:

• CA 2006 Part 2 - Company formation (name, office, capital, directors)
• CA 2006 ss.53-81 - Company name restrictions
• CA 2006 ss.171-177 - Seven statutory director duties
• CA 2006 s.763 - Minimum capital (£50k for plc, none for private)
• CA 2006 s.586 - 25% paid up for public companies

use legalis_uk::company::{CompanyFormation, CompanyType, validate_company_formation};

let formation = CompanyFormation::new("Acme Ltd")
    .with_company_type(CompanyType::PrivateLimitedByShares)
    .with_registered_office(/* ... */)
    .with_director(/* ... */)
    .with_share_capital(10000.0);

validate_company_formation(&formation)?;

Legal System Features

The UK legal system (England & Wales) follows the Common Law tradition with these characteristics:

• Precedent-based: Judicial decisions (case law) are primary source
• Stare decisis: Binding precedent from higher courts
• Inductive reasoning: Case-to-case reasoning by analogy
• Statutory law: Acts of Parliament supplemented by common law
• Flexibility: Courts can distinguish cases and develop law

Comparison with Civil Law

UK-Specific Considerations

Regional Variations

• England & Wales: Single legal jurisdiction (covered by this crate)
• Scotland: Separate legal system (hybrid civil/common law) - not yet implemented
• Northern Ireland: Separate but similar to E&W - not yet implemented

Statute Referencing

UK statutes are referenced as:

• ERA 1996 s.86 (section 86 of Employment Rights Act 1996)
• CA 2006 ss.171-177 (sections 171 to 177 of Companies Act 2006)
• CRA 2015 s.9 (section 9 of Consumer Rights Act 2015)

Not European-style article numbers (e.g., "Article 6").

Court Hierarchy

• Supreme Court (highest, binds all lower courts)
• Court of Appeal (binds High Court and below)
• High Court (binds County Court and tribunals)
• County Court / Employment Tribunal

Modules

• employment - Employment Rights Act 1996, Working Time Regulations 1998
• data_protection - UK GDPR, Data Protection Act 2018 (80% reuse from EU)
• consumer_rights - Consumer Rights Act 2015
• contract - Common law contract principles
• company - Companies Act 2006

Dependencies

• legalis-core - Core legal framework
• legalis-eu - EU GDPR implementation (reused for UK GDPR)
• legalis-i18n - Internationalization support
• chrono - Date and time handling
• thiserror - Error handling
• uuid - Unique identifiers
• serde - Serialization (optional feature)

Examples

See the examples/ directory for comprehensive usage examples:

• employment-contract-validation.rs - Employment contract compliance
• uk-gdpr-consent-validation.rs - UK GDPR consent validation
• consumer-goods-remedy.rs - Consumer rights tiered remedies
• contract-formation.rs - Common law contract formation
• company-formation.rs - Companies Act 2006 company formation

Implementation Status

• ✅ Project structure and dependencies
• 🚧 Employment Law module (in progress)
• ⏳ Data Protection module (planned)
• ⏳ Consumer Rights module (planned)
• ⏳ Contract Law module (planned)
• ⏳ Company Law module (planned)

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please see the main Legalis-RS repository for contribution guidelines.

License

See the LICENSE file in the main repository.

References

• UK Legislation
• Employment Rights Act 1996
• Companies Act 2006
• Consumer Rights Act 2015
• Data Protection Act 2018
• UK GDPR
• ICO (Information Commissioner's Office)