Appeals on a Point of Law in the English Courts: Further Restrictions
The judgment in the case of Mary Harvey v. Motor Insurer’s Bureau (QBD (Merc) (Manchester), Claim No: 0MA40077, 21 December 2011) just before Christmas provided another opportunity for the English courts to rule on their ability to consider appeals on a point of law.
This controversial power, retained in the UK’s Arbitration Act notwithstanding its absence from most other national legal systems, has often been criticised. Perhaps for this reason, the trend of the English courts in recent years has been increasingly to restrict its application. This latest, fully reasoned, judgment is no exception.
The Claimant, Mary Harvey, was a victim of a road traffic accident, and applied to the Motor In [...]
An anti-suit injunction to protect a non-existent arbitration
The Court of Appeal of England and Wales ruled last month that where parties have entered into an arbitration agreement, one party can obtain an anti-suit injunction to prevent the other party from initiating proceedings in a foreign court, even where no arbitration is underway or indeed even contemplated.
In AES Ust-Kamenogorsk Hydropower Plant LLP v Ust-Kamenogorsk Hydropower Plant JSC [2011] EWCA Civ 647, the claimant was a Kazakh subsidiary of a US energy company and operator under a concession agreement with the Kazakh owner, a company deriving its rights from the State. In an earlier dispute, the Kazakh Supreme Court had ruled that the arbitration clause (providing for a seat in Londo [...]
