Lloyd's Maritime and Commercial Law Quarterly
MARITIME CLAIMS: THE EUROPEAN JUDGMENTS CONVENTION
Geoffrey Brice, Q.C.
Introduction
The Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982 (“the CJJA”) enacted into English law the European Judgments Convention 1968 (“the EJC”).1 The CJJA came substantially into force on 1 January 1987 (certain subsidiary provisions listed in Sch. 13 thereto and in s. 26 already being in force). It applies to proceedings commenced on or after that date.2 Its effect on litigation in the United Kingdom is marked. In every case it is now necessary to ask the question: “Is this a case to which the EJC applies?” If it does apply, one must comply with it.
At present there are eight states which are parties to the EJC, namely the original six EEC states (France, West Germany, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Belgium and Italy) together with the United Kingdom and Denmark. It is expected that the Republic of Ireland will soon become a party (and later Greece, Spain and Portugal, the three remaining EEC countries).
The EJC is basically concerned with (1) establishing which jurisdictions are the permissible jurisdictions for making particular classes of claim and (2) the automatic recognition and enforcement of judgments given by a court of one Contracting State in the courts of the other Contracting States. Many of its provisions are mandatory, so that (for example) a court in one Contracting State must in many instances decline jurisdiction in favour of a court in another Contracting State.
The EJC is very complex. In applying it to a case relating to the granting of leave to serve proceedings out of the jurisdiction, Staughton, J., referred to its effects in that case as “byzantine”.3 It was drafted originally for states whose laws were based on the Code Napoleon. For that reason it did not take account of common law concepts or common law procedures or of English admiralty law. The CJJA itself must of course be construed according to the normal English legal rules of construction; but the EJC (which is scheduled to it) must be construed as a European court would undertake that task so as to have regard (for example) to the spirit and purpose of
1. i.e. the Brussels Convention on Jurisdiction and the Enforcement of Judgments in Civil and Commercial Matters 27 September 1968 (including the 1971 Protocol on the interpretation of the Convention by the European Court, Luxembourg, 3 June 1971): see CJJA, s. 1(1).
2. CJJA, Sch. 3 (Accession Convention), Art. 34. The “Accession Convention” means the Convention on the accession to the 1968 Convention and to the 1971 Protocol of Denmark, the Republic of Ireland and the U.K., Luxembourg, 9 October 1978: see CJJA, s. 1(1). Judgments given in respect of proceedings instituted before 1 January 1987 may in certain circumstances have to be recognized and enforced under the EJC: see the Accession Convention 1978, Art. 34(3) and the discussion on recognition and enforcement of judgments below.
3. The Volvox Hollandia. Judgment 1 May 1987. To be reported in [1987] 2 Lloyd’s Rep.
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