Lloyd's Maritime and Commercial Law Quarterly
THIRD INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF MARITIME ARBITRATORS
Summaries of the papers presented
The Third International Congress of Maritime Arbitrators took place at the Grand Hotel Miramare, Santa Margherita Ligure, Italy, from Apr. 27 to May 1, inclusive. The Congress was organised by Lloyd’s of London Press Ltd., and there were 20 nations represented at the meeting under the chairmanship of Professor Francesco Berlingieri, of Italy. The following gentlemen chaired the six working sessions:—Dr. Ralph Kingsley (United Kingdom); Mr. Jack Berg (United States); Mr. G. A. Maslov (U.S.S.R.); Professor Roger Jambu-Merlin (France); Professor J. C. Schultsz (Holland); and Dr. Johannes Trappe (German Federal Republic). We reproduce below summaries of the papers presented during the sessions, together with summaries of the interventions by participants and the conclusions drawn by the Rapporteur, Mr. Cedric Barclay, of the United Kingdom. We wish to acknowledge the kind assistance rendered by Mr. Barclay in the compilation of the material presented hereunder.
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The subject of the first day’s session in the morning of Apr. 28 was “The Structure of Awards,” under the chairmanship of Dr. Ralph Kingsley.
The first speaker, Mr. L. Alexander (U.K.), said he was not a maritime arbitrator but, as a past president of the Institute of Arbitrators he wanted to stress the freedom of composition of English awards and the fact that the Courts approved in the widest measure the various forms adopted by many arbitrators. Stylised forms were not required but basic principles could not be disregarded. Precision was of the essence and a sample English award was submitted.
Mr. Stanislaw Mozejko (Poland) outlined the procedure of the Gdynia International Court of Arbitration, mentioning details of the National Law and the type of agreement signed by the parties, with illustrations of the forms adopted for awards under Institutional Association systems.
Mr. M. M. Cohen (U.S.) a multilinguist who first spoke in Italian, had reviewed 100 English language forms. He referred to the questionnaire which he had circulated regarding National rules. He thanked those who had replied and asked for further contributions. Discussing the service of notice under the sugar and oil trade charter-parties, he mentioned that service of notice of arbitration in the United States had to be by way of a delivery by hand to an officer of the respondent corporation. This was difficult with Liberian or similar non-territorial companies, and relief before U.S. Courts was not obtainable unless the requirement was met. It gave the respondents an opportunity for delaying action.
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