Lloyd's Maritime and Commercial Law Quarterly
BOOK REVIEW - ARREST OF SHIPS: A COMMENTARY ON THE 1952 ARREST CONVENTION
ARREST OF SHIPS: A Commentary on the 1952 Arrest Convention. Francesco Berlingieri, Former Professor of Maritime Law, University of Genoa, Honorary President, C.M.I., Advocate, Senior Partner, Studio Legale Berlingieri. Lloyd’s of London Press, London (1992) xxxvii and 183 pp., plus 58 pp. Appendices and 6 pp. Index. Hardback £65.
If any English lawyers thought that the 1952 Arrest Convention was a subject only of international law, they would have received a shock when they read the judgment of Hobhouse, J., in The Nordglimt [1988] Q.B. 183, 196–197, where he said that:
as a matter of English municipal law, although the 1952 Convention itself has never been made part of English municipal law, international conventions which expressly recognise and preserve the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom under the 1952 Convention have, by the terms of the [Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982], been made part of English municipal law. Accordingly, there has been an indirect incorporation of the 1952 Convention into English municipal law through the 1968 [Brussels] Convention … It is clear that under the Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982 the English courts must now recognise their role as being one of working within the framework of an international scheme of conventions to which the English courts are under an obligation to give effect.
The publication of this commentary on the Arrest Convention by Professor Berlingieri is therefore a welcome and timely contribution to this field. However, this book is not simply a commentary on the text of the 1952 Convention. It is more an analysis of the operation of the Convention placed in the context of its historical origins and its proposed reform by way of the Lisbon Draft revision.
This approach may be illustrated by reference to Professor Berlingieri’s discussion of the claims in respect of which a ship may be arrested. He begins by explaining the origin of the “closed” list of claims to be found in the 1952 Convention. This arose out of the conflict between the views of the civil law countries, that arrest should be permissible in respect of any claim, and the views of the common law countries, that it should only be permitted in respect of specific “maritime” claims. He then refers to the solution adopted at Lisbon, of having a general clause supplemented by a non-exhaustive list, before continuing with a detailed discussion of the list of claims as set out in the 1952 Convention. Again, throughout
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