The worldwide health alert triggered by coronavirus is generating a great deal of uncertainty among companies, affecting all aspects of their activity. Garrigues offers its clients multidisciplinary teams specializing in all practice areas in the countries in which it operates. Since the crisis took hold, the firm has established a team of professionals responsible for supervising the contents of this Special section, in which we provide information on all legal developments in relation to the coronavirus crisis, on proposals made by social partners, agreements, decisions, orders, etc.; in short, all the relevant information which companies need to be aware of.
The Portuguese Government approved, through Dispatch n.º 52/2021-XXII, of 25 February, a new review of the payment flexibility scheme for the payment of the VAT to the State, now assessed in December 2020 by the taxpayers under monthly returns or in the 4th quarter of 2020 by the taxpayers under quarterly returns.
It was published in the official gazette the Decree-Law no. 14-B/2021, of 22 February, which expanded the exceptional financial aid for families due to the suspension of in person curricular and non-curricular activities to teleworkers and increased the amount to be paid to the beneficiaries and bear by Social Security.
The Portuguese Government approved, through Order of SEAF no. 43/2021-XXII, of 15 February and Circular Letter no. 30232, of 17 February 2021, new deadlines extensions for the fulfillment of several tax obligations, without the application of any penalties.
The obligation to communicate inventories to the Portuguese Tax Authority was postponed from 31 January to 28 February 2021 by Dispatch no. 25/2021-XXII, of 28 January.
As a result of the exceptional worsening of the COVID-19 pandemic currently in Portugal, the Portuguese Parliament, at the proposal of the Government, approved Law No 4-B/2021, dated February 1, determining a set of exceptional, temporary and urgent measures within the scope of the development of judicial and administrative activities, basically returning to and developing measures already applied previously in the first half of 2020 when combatting the first wave of the pandemic.
Royal Decree-Law 2/2021, of January 26, 2021, on reinforcing and consolidating social protection measures to defend employment has been published following the IV Social Protection Agreement to Defend Employment reached between the government, Spanish unions UGT and CC.OO. and employers’ associations CEOE and CEPYME.
Managing and administrative bodies of business and civil legal entities may as an exception in 2021 hold meetings by phone or remotely or take action by written consent without holding a meeting, even where not expressly permitted by their bylaws.
2020 was without doubt an exceptional year. The COVID-19 global pandemic has impacted on all our lives and that has required us to make significant adjustments to way we conduct arbitration across the world. Despite the challenges that the pandemic has created, the adaptability and flexibility of arbitration have risen to these new challenges. We highlight below some of the most important and commented news during 2020. These include, amongst other topics, the agreements reached in the renewable energy claims against Spain, the publishing of the new LCIA rules, the expected Spanish Constitutional Court judgement regarding the control of arbitral awards by the courts and the recent UK Supreme Court ruling clarifying the law on an arbitrator’s duty to disclose.
The judges of the Commercial Courts of Barcelona have released a set of basic guidelines for conducting Spanish insolvency pre-packs in that forum, by introducing the feature -of optional use- of the silent administrator. The guidelines were approved in the context of a seminar organized on January 20th.