Agrégateur de flux

AG  Saugmandsgaard Øe delivered yesterday (29 October 2020) his opinion in case C‑804/19 (BU v Markt24 GmbH), which is about Brussels I bis and employment contracts in an interesting scenario where no effective work has been carried out. The opinion is currently available in all EU official languages only (save Irish). It is not available in English. Here is the French version (to check whether an English translation has finally been made available, just click on the link below and change the language version):

« 1) Une action en paiement de la rémunération convenue dans un contrat de travail, intentée par un travailleur domicilié dans un État membre contre un employeur domicilié dans un autre État membre, relève du règlement (UE) no 1215/2012 […] et, plus spécifiquement, de la section 5 de son chapitre II, et ce même lorsqu’aucune prestation de travail n’a été accomplie, dans les faits, par ce travailleur en exécution du contrat litigieux.

2) Le règlement no 1215/2012 s’oppose à l’application de règles de compétence, prévues dans le droit national de la juridiction saisie, qui permettent au travailleur de saisir le tribunal dans le ressort duquel il a son domicile ou sa résidence habituelle pendant la durée de la relation de travail, ou de saisir le tribunal dans le ressort duquel la rémunération est due.

3) Lorsqu’un travailleur et un employeur ont conclu un contrat de travail et que, pour une raison quelconque, aucune prestation de travail n’a été accomplie, dans les faits, par ce travailleur en exécution du contrat, le « lieu où ou à partir duquel le travailleur accomplit habituellement son travail », au sens de l’article 21, paragraphe 1, sous b), i), du règlement no 1215/2012, correspond, en principe, au lieu de travail convenu dans ledit contrat ».

Source : http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?docid=233041&mode=req&pageIndex=1&dir=&occ=first&part=1&text=&doclang=FR&cid=10869171

On 29 October 2020, Costa Rica acceded to the HCCH Convention of 19 October 1996 on Jurisdiction, Applicable Law, Recognition, Enforcement and Co-operation in respect of Parental Responsibility and Measures for the Protection of Children, which will enter into force for Costa Rica on 1 August 2021.

Source: https://www.hcch.net/en/news-archive/details/?varevent=762

The Explanatory Report on the HCCH Convention of 2 July 2019 on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Judgments in Civil or Commercial Matters has been officially published in both English and French. Please find attached to this post the English version.

explanatory-report-hague-judgments-conventionDownload

Source: https://www.hcch.net/en/news-archive/details/?varevent=761

The International Commercial Chamber of the Court of Appeal of Paris (France) delivered a few days ago (27 October 2020) a decision (RG 20/01368) on commercial agents.  

Summary:

“The ICCP -CA was seized by an appeal against a decision of the Paris Commercial Court, which ruled that a commercial agent was liable of a serious breach, excluding the termination indemnities provided for in Articles L.134-11 et seq. of the French Commercial Code.

The ICCP -CA overturned this decision, ruling that a serious breach makes it impossible to maintain the contractual relationship; and that cannot be qualified as serious a breach of which the principal was aware well before the termination of the contract and which it tolerated without blaming the agent or warning or advising of the risk that this breach might have on the continuation of the agency contract. 

The Court thus held that the breach allegedly committed by the commercial agent in 2007, relating to the allegedly faulty registration of the disputed trademark in China, discovered in 2013, and followed by a retrocession agreement in 2014, cannot be qualified as serious enough to deprive the termination notified on 22 September 2016 of any indemnity .

The Court also held that the grievances subsequently raised by the principal were admissible even if they were not included in the letter of termination as they predated the termination; but in the present case, their existence and seriousness were not established and did not amount to a general lack of loyalty”.

27-octobre-2020-ccip-ca-rg-2001368Download

In May 2019 a seminar took place in Madrid on the occasion of the 90th anniversary of UNIDROIT. A book has followed edited by Alfonso Luis Calvo Caravaca (Universidad Carlos III, Madrid) and Ignacio Tirado Martí (Universidad Autónoma, Madrid, current Secretary General of UNIDROIT), with contributions in English and Spanish from Lena Peters, Alfonso Luis Calvo Caravaca and Javier Carrascosa González, Marta Requejo Isidro, Carlos Fernández Liesa, Celia Caamiña Domínguez, Anna Veneziano, Teresa Rodríguez de las Heras, and William Brydie-Watson, recalling some of the main achievements of the organization. The introductory words by Prof. Calvo summarize his intervention a the seminar:

UNIDROIT emerged within the League of Nations in 1926. Its cradle is the origin and meaning of its mandate. The spirit of cooperation between nations, as a method of overcoming the differences that had plagued much of the world during the First World War, had its corollary in bringing the different legal systems closer together and promoting socio-economic exchanges between citizens. of the world. In large part, the idea that was beating was none other than the consideration of commercial relations as the axis on which to build a world in peace.

The founding ideas remain in the DNA of the institution, which began as predominantly European (since the Great War had been predominantly European) and gradually became global. Currently, UNIDROIT gathers 63 countries, including all members of the G-20 and covering 80% of the world’s population. There has never been a better time for the unification of private law. UNIDROIT is part of the list of international organizations known as “Las Tres Hermanas” (the Three Sisters), together with the Hague Conference on Private International Law and the United Nations Commission for International Trade Law. The three institutions are currently developing an almost frenetic activity of great practical and academic relevance. This relationship, synergistic and sustained over time, entails a reciprocal benefit that we aspire to reinforce with this initiative, which we hope will be followed by many others.

For more information, see here.

Le 18 octobre 2020, le Conseil des régions, qui réunit les président.es des régions de France, a publié une motion pour « réaffirmer avec force leur volonté de défendre vigoureusement le siège du Parlement européen en France, à Strasbourg ». Aucune session ne s’est en effet tenue dans la métropole alsacienne depuis le mois de mars, en raison de la covid-19, ce qui ravive le débat ancien relatif au déplacement du siège à Bruxelles.

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Veselības ministrija
Sécurité sociale des travailleurs migrants
Le refus, par l’État membre d’affiliation d’un patient, d’accorder une autorisation préalable pour le remboursement des coûts de soins de santé transfrontaliers lorsqu’un traitement hospitalier efficace est disponible dans cet État mais que les croyances religieuses de l’affilié réprouvent le mode de traitement utilisé instaure une différence de traitement indirectement fondée sur la religion

Commission / Italie e.a.
Aide d'État
L’avocat général Tanchev recommande à la Cour de rejeter le pourvoi formé par la Commission contre l’arrêt du Tribunal relatif aux mesures adoptées par un consortium de banques italiennes pour soutenir l’un de ses membres

We are happy to announce that Alina Ontanu, of the University of Rotterdam, has joined the team of the EAPIL blog! Check her first post, which is out today.

As indicated in the inaugural issue of the EAPIL Newsletter, we wish to further expand the team. Interested EAPIL members are encouraged to get in touch with the managing editor, Pietro Franzina, at pietro.franzina@unicatt.it.

Applications from scholars or practitioners willing to report about developments in countries other than the countries currently covered by the team are especially welcome (the team is now covering Cyprus, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, and Spain).

The Blog is also seeking to appoint a social media manager, to improve and consolidate the Blog’s presence on LinkedIn, Twitter etc. Those applying for editor are encouraged to state whether they would also be happy to take care of the latter aspects.

On 6 November 2020 (13:30 – 16:30 CET) the Royal Netherlands Society of International Law (KNVIR) will be holding its Annual Meeting online via Zoom. This year the invited legal experts will be focusing on the theme of adaptability of (private) international law to the digital environment.

In their presentations Marjolein Busstra, Wieteke Teeuwen (Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs), Ybo Buruma (Netherlands Supreme Court and Radboud University Nijmegen), and Jerker B. Svantesson (Bond University; Swedish Law & Informatics Research Institute, Stockholm University, Sweden and Masaryk University) will be discussing whether the concepts and ideas developed in the ‘predigital era’ still fit the digital world. In doing so the speakers will analyse whether international law (both public and private) is ready for the digital era or whether law has been a rather ‘fragmented follower of developments’ and we should be fundamentally rethinking a number of notions and approaches.

Marjolein Busstra and Wieteke Teeuwen will focus on International Law in the Context of Cyber Operations. Ybo Buruma will look at internet from the perspective of International Law and Cyberspace – Issues of Sovereignty and the Common Good. Finally, Jerker B. Svantesson will be discussing whether International Law [Is] Ready for the (Already Ongoing) Digital Age: Perspectives from Private and Public International Law.

Registration is open until 3 November 2000 at info@knvir.org.

The reports (preadviezen) prepared by the legal experts have been published in November by Asser Press under the title International Law for a Digitalised World. You can find more information about this here.

Action civile - FNAEG

Chambre de l'instruction

Entreprise en difficulté (loi du 26 juillet 2005)

Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Détermination des taux des péages pour l'utilisation d'autoroutes)
Fiscalité
Les coûts liés à la police de la route ne peuvent pas être pris en compte pour le calcul des péages pour l’utilisation du réseau routier transeuropéen par les poids lourds

Shenzhen Senior Technology Material Co Ltd v Celgard, LLC [2020] EWCA Civ 1293 concerns an appeal against service out of jurisdiction (the judgment appealed is [2020] EWHC 2072 (Ch)). Celgard allege that the importation and marketing by Senior of battery separator film involves the misuse of Celgard’s trade secrets.

Senior (of China) contend that the judge fell into error in concluding, first, that Celgard (incorporated in Delaware) had established a serious issue to be tried (here part of the jurisdictional threshold) assuming that English law applies to its claims and, secondly, that England is the proper forum to try the claims. As to the latter the core argument is that in limiting its claims to remedies in respect of acts in the UK, Celgard could not establish the requisite degree of connection to England. As for the former, they argue the law applicable to Celgard’s claims is Chinese law, which would count against jurisdiction.

Strategically, Celgard’s case against Senior is not based on breach of the NDA applicable between Celgard and one of its former employees,  Dr Zhang who, when he left Celgard, told its then COO that he was going to work for General Electric in California, which does not compete with Celgard in the field of battery separators. It later transpired that he had in fact joined Senior in China, where he was using the false name “Bin Wang”. This element of the facts triggers the question whether Senior is liable for the acts of another, even if that other is its employee.

The Celgard – Zhang NDA is governed by the law of South Carolina, application of which would also have triggered A4(3)(b) or (c) of the Trade Secrets Directive 2016/943. Celgard do rely on the NDA as supporting its case that the trade secrets were confidential. Rather Celgard claim that Senior’s employee acted in breach of an equitable obligation. This engages Rome II,  specifically Article 6(2) because Celgard’s claims are concerned with an act of unfair competition affecting exclusively the interests of a specific competitor, namely Celgard. In such circumstances, Article 6(2) provides that “Article 4 shall apply”.

Of note is that this is one of those cases that show that Rome II applies to more than just tortious obligations: as Arnold LJ notes at 51, as a matter of English law, claims for breach of equitable obligations of confidence are not claims in tort.

Celgard’s case, accepted by Trowe J at the High Court, is that A4(1) leads to English law because the ‘direct damage’ (per Rome II and CJEU Lazard indirect damage needs to be ignored) caused by the wrongdoing it complains of has occurred (and will, if not restrained, continue to occur) in the UK, that being the country into which the infringing goods (namely the shipment to the UK Customer and any future shipments of the same separator) have been (and will be) imported, causing damage to Celgard’s market here.

Senior’s case is that confidential information is intangible property and that damage to intangible property is located at the time and place it became irreversible (support is sought in extracts from Andrew Dickinson’s Rome II volume with OUP). At 58 ff Arnold LJ gives 7 reasons for rejecting the position. I will not repeat them all here. Of note is not just the (most justifiable) heavy leaning on the travaux but also the support sought in secondary EU law different from private international law (such as the Trade Secrets Directive 2016/943) as well as in the consistency between Brussels Ia and the Rome Regulations [on which Szpunar AG has written excellently in Burkhard Hess and Koen Lenaerts (eds.), The 50th Anniversary of the European Law of Civil Procedure]. This is not an easy proposition however given the lack of detail in Rome I and the need for autonomous EU interpretation, understandable.

The Trade Secrets Directive is further discussed at 65 ff for in A4(5) it makes importation of infringing goods an unlawful use of a trade secret “where the person carrying out such activities knew, or ought, under the circumstances, to have known that the trade secret was used unlawfully within the meaning of paragraph 3”. One of the possibilities embraced by paragraph 3 is (a), the person “having acquired the trade secret unlawfully”. Arnold LJ then asks: what law is to be applied to determine whether it was acquired “unlawfully”? Is A4(5) read together with A4(3)(a) an implicit choice of law rule pointing to the law of the place where the trade secret was acquired? Arnold LJ suggests this is not acte clair and may need CJEU clarification however not at this stage for his provisional view (with an eye on the jurisdictional threshold test) is that the Directive is not an implicit choice of law rule and that per Rome II, English law applies.

Plenty applicable law issues to discuss at the merits stage.

Geert.

(Handbook of) EU Private International Law, 2nd ed. 2016, Chapter 4, Heading 4.6.2. Third ed. forthcoming February 2021.

 

 

Service out of jurisdiction with core role for applicable law considerations: Article 6 junto 4 Rome II, unfair competition. https://t.co/BUUjFlzY9P

— Geert Van Calster (@GAVClaw) October 9, 2020