In his Preface, Lawrence Collins describes the Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments Act 1982 as “perhaps the most important piece of legislation relating to civil procedure enacted in this country this century”. As one who sat on the same Working Party as Lawrence Collins considering the implementation in legislative form of the EEC Conventions of 1968 and 1978 on jurisdiction and the enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters, this reviewer agrees whole-heartedly with that judgment. Indeed force is added to it, when the 1982 Act is coupled with the significant amendments to those Rules of the Supreme Court (especially Order 11, rule 1) which deal with jurisdiction and with the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments and which are due to come into force at the same time as those parts of the 1982 Act which implement the EEC Conventions.

Lord Denning has talked of the tide of EEC law flowing up our estuaries and rivers but the effect of this flow on the average practitioner has been limited. The expert in competition law has had to tangle with Arts. 85 and 86 of the Treaty of Rome and the company lawyer with a build-up of harmonization legislation; but the law making regime in Brussels has not, so far, provided much impact on general practice. The 1982 Act will change that. Every solicitor concerned with any form of litigation involving a party closely connected with an EEC Member State will need to know his way round the 1982 Act and its annexed Schedules.

To maintain Lord Denning’s metaphor, a master pilot is required for this tricky navigational task. Fortunately the book under review provides such expert guidance. Its appearance is timely. The 1968 Brussels Convention on jurisdiction and the enforcement of judgments has been in force for a decade between the six original EEC partners. The three States which later acceded to the Treaty of Rome concluded in 1978 their Convention of accession to the original 1968 Convention (and Greece acceded to the amended Convention in 1982) and it seems very likely that, by the autumn of this year, the 1968 Convention as amended (in places substantially) by the 1978 Convention will be in force in this country and throughout most of the rest of the EEC. Not only is the book timely, but it combines great scholarship with the practical perspective of the experienced practising solicitor—a vital, and impressive, combination for the subject-matter of this book.

There are four main matters examined in the book (as well as appendices containing the 1982 Act, the new Rules of the Supreme Court and the 1982 Greek Accession Convention). The heart of the book is a detailed examination of the new rules laid