| In Principle

Under a proposed amendment to Poland’s Rail Transport Act, it will be easier to obtain siting decisions for rail projects and expand logistics centres and railroad sidings on rail land, and train travel should be safer.

On 21 October 2022, a draft act to amend the Energy Law and certain other acts was published on the website of the Government Legislation Centre, implementing the Polish Hydrogen Strategy. The proposal aims to create a stable regulatory environment for the hydrogen market in Poland.

On 2 September 2022, the Polish Ministry of Justice published a draft of far-reaching changes to the liability of collective entities, which would eliminate the requirement to obtain a predicate ruling for all criminal and fiscal offences for which collective entities could be held criminally liable. We discuss these changes in an updated version of our guide to corporate criminal liability in Poland.

The war in Ukraine is affecting the insurance sector. If a judicial or arbitration dispute arises, the parties will need to interpret the insurer’s exclusion of liability “in the event of war.”

 

One of the participants in the construction process carried out under FIDIC contract terms is the engineer, acting as the contract administrator. The engineer’s task is to take the necessary steps to ensure that the contract is performed correctly and on time. Among other things, the engineer can issue a determination on how to handle a matter. When can the engineer do this?

It’s hard to explain to someone who has never been accused of a crime that they cannot use their own money, and this situation could last for months. Nonetheless, an institution exerting this effect functions under Polish law and can impact both individuals and companies.

Filip Rak, adwokat, associate in the Business Crime practice and Litigation practice at Wardyński & Partners, focuses on implementing diversity and inclusion policies in companies.

The act amending the Commercial Companies Code which will come into force on 13 October 2022 not only establishes rules for the operation of formalised corporate groups, but also modifies some rules for the functioning of corporate bodies of companies, including supervisory boards. The question is whether the change will have a positive impact on the work of supervisory bodies.

One of the ways to reduce business costs in a corporate group may be to combine multiple entities into a single entity—a merger. Although all types of companies and partnerships can take part in a merger, the regulations regarding mergers involving partnerships are sometimes unclear, and mistakes during the merger process can result in the court’s refusal to register the merger.

More and more requests are filed with Polish prosecutors and courts by other countries seeking extradition of wanted persons found in Poland. These persons often are not even aware that they are sought by law enforcement authorities in another country to face criminal charges there or to enforce existing criminal sanctions.

Effective as of 1 July 2022, the new Developers Act expands the scope of bank oversight of development ventures before paying out to the developer the funds due for a given phase of the project. But the regulations are imprecise, and it is unclear whether the bank must redo the audit when the buyer has made a late payment of funds into an open housing escrow account.

Joanna Krakowiak, attorney-at-law, member of the Council of the European Food Law Association, of counsel at Wardyński & Partners coordinating the work of the Life Sciences & Healthcare practice, explains how the war in Ukraine is forcing regulators to make changes to food law.