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As was announced earlier on this blog, on 25 and 26 February a conference will be held at Erasmus University Rotterdam (Netherlands) on the theme From common rules to best practices in European Civil Procedure, jointly organized by Erasmus School of Law and the Max Planck Institute in Luxembourg.

The conference brings together distinguished academics, practitioners, legislators, and policy makers, discussing in panels the need for common rules to facilitate judicial cooperation and mutual trust, procedural innovation and e-justice in the EU, alternative dispute resolution, and best practices on the operationalization of judicial cooperation.

The program and more information is available here and you are cordially invited to register.

The Council of the European Union is expected to adopt at its next meeting on Justice and Home Affairs, scheduled to take place on 3 and 4 December 2015, a political agreement on the compromise text of the future regulation on jurisdiction, applicable law and the recognition and enforcement of decisions in matters of matrimonial property regimes (see here, however, for a corrigendum), and the compromise text of the future regulation on jurisdiction, applicable law and the recognition and enforcement of decisions regarding the property consequences of registered partnerships.

The initiative comes one year after the Council had observed that “some member states needed more time to complete their internal reflection process” on the two Commission proposals of 2011 and decided to “re-examine this matter as soon as possible, and by no later than the end of 2015″.

The Council of the European Union is expected to adopt at its next meeting on Justice and Home Affairs, scheduled to take place on 3 and 4 December 2015, a political agreement on the compromise text of the future regulation on jurisdiction, applicable law and the recognition and enforcement of decisions in matters of matrimonial property regimes (see here, however, for a corrigendum), and the compromise text of the future regulation on jurisdiction, applicable law and the recognition and enforcement of decisions regarding the property consequences of registered partnerships.

The initiative comes one year after the Council had observed that “some member states needed more time to complete their internal reflection process” on the two Commission proposals of 2011 and decided to “re-examine this matter as soon as possible, and by no later than the end of 2015”.

Le juge de l’annulation de la sentence arbitrale internationale ne fait qu’user de la faculté qui lui était offerte par l’article 267 du Traité sur le fonctionnement de l’Union européenne (TFUE), de demander à la Cour de justice de l’Union européenne (CJUE) de statuer sur une question d’interprétation de ce traité.

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La CEDH a jugé que la consultation, par la justice portugaise, des comptes bancaires d’une avocate dans le cadre d’une procédure pénale pour fraude fiscale, violait les dispositions de l’article 8 de la Convention sur les droit au respect de la vie privée et au secret des correspondances.

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Although it is hard to believe given his prolific writing and his remarkable fitness, American-German conflicts giant Professor Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Peter Hay has actually celebrated his eightieth birthday on 17 September this year in Berlin. On this occasion, he has been honoured by a publication of Selected Essays on Comparative Law and Conflict of Laws, edited by Hans-Eric Rasmussen-Bonne and Manana Khachidze. For further information, click here. This volume is a collection of articles, case notes and book reviews authored by Professor Hay, both in English and in German. The contributions cover the whole range of his academic interests, mainly private international law, comparative law and international civil procedure. Taken together, they provide a fascinating view of the development of private international law and comparative law in recent decades, from the U.S. conflicts revolution in the 1960’s to the Europeanization of conflict of laws since the Treaty of Amsterdam. This book is a testimony to a truly impressive lifetime achievement, and it is to be hoped that many more contributions will be added in the future. Ad multos annos!

Samuel Fulli-Lemaire, Affaire PIP : quelques réflexions sur les aspects de droit international privé, in Revue Internationale de Droit Économique, 2015, pp. 99-122.

[Abstract] – Plusieurs voies s’offrent aux porteuses d’implants mammaires fabriqués par la société PIP pour l’indemnisation de leurs préjudices. La présente étude aborde certaines des implications, au regard du droit international privé, des actions en responsabilité délictuelle qui peuvent être intentées par les victimes contre le fabricant ou ses dirigeants sociaux, contre son assureur, et enfin contre l’organisme notifié, c’est-à-dire l’entité chargée de conduire la procédure d’évaluation de conformité d’un produit de santé aux exigences européennes. Dans chaque hypothèse, les aspects relatifs à la compétence internationale et à la loi applicable seront évoqués. Il ressort de cette analyse que de nombreuses stratégies contentieuses peuvent être envisagées, et si cette diversité peut sembler servir l’objectif assurément louable d’une meilleure indemnisation des victimes, ou au moins de certaines d’entre elles, elle doit aussi conduire à nuancer la vision du marché intérieur comme un ensemble cohérent. Certaines de ces difficultés pourraient être atténuées, sinon résolues, par la généralisation de mécanismes d’actions de groupe, mais l’articulation de ces derniers et des règles de droit international privé soulèverait d’autres complications.

Pourvoi c/ Cour d'appel de Douai, 29 mai 2015

Pourvoi c/ Cour d'appel de Paris, 11 mars 2015

Pourvoi c/ Cour d'appel de Douai, 20 novembre 2014

Pourvoi c/ Cour d'appel de Versailles, 19 octobre 2015

Pourvoi c/ Cour d'appel de Paris, Chambre de l'instruction, 7 février 2007

Confession time: when teaching the general conflicts course I tend to simply say about Article 71 of the Brussels I Regulation (unchanged in the Recast): ‘it’s complicated’. I have also briefly flagged the Article in my posting on Nickel and Goeldner. I suppose I should not be quite so shy in addressing the relationship even in an introductory conflicts class for, essentially, it is not that complicated at least form a hierarchical point of view. Article 71 mirrors Article 351 TFEU which states that any rights or obligations arising prior to the TFEU shall not be affected by it unless the agreements are not compatible with the TFEU. At stake therefore is a review by the courts whether international agreements between the Member States prior to the creation of the EU, are compatible with the TFEU.

In BAT Denmark v Kazemier and BAT Switserland v Essers, the United Kingdom Supreme Court had to carry out this exercise vis-a-vis the 1956 CMR Convention –   the Convention on the Contract for the International Carriage of Goods by Road. As Steven Baker notes, Lord Mance kicks off his judgment with the rather delightfully accurate ‘Cigarettes attract smokers, smugglers and thieves’. Tobacco manufactuters are also of course active litigators hence providing us with repeated opportunity to review case-law on a wide variety of contractual and other matters.

In the two appeals, one container load was allegedly hi-jacked in Belgium en route between Switzerland and The Netherlands in September 2011, while another allegedly lost 756 of its original 1386 cartons while parked overnight contrary to express instructions near Copenhagen en route between Hungary and Vallensbaek, Denmark.

The consignors (two of BAT’s corporate vehicles) are claiming against English main contractors who undertook responsibility for the carriage and against sub-contractors in whose hands the cigarettes were when the alleged losses occurred. The carriage was subject to the Convention on the Contract for the International Carriage of Goods by Road 1956 (“CMR”), given the force of law in the United Kingdom by the Carriage of Goods by Road Act 1965.

English law and English jurisdiction are said to offer the advantage that such duty and/or taxes are recoverable in a CMR claim against carriers, which is not the case in some other jurisdictions (at 4).

Citing (and reading in a particular way) CJEU precedent, in particular  Nipponkoa Insurance Co (Europe) Ltd v Inter-Zuid Transport BV (DTC Surhuisterveen BV intervening), C-452/12, the Supreme Court held (at 57) that CMR represents a balanced jurisdictional régime adopted across a wide-range of some 55 states, only half of which are Union member states. It did not regard its tailored balance as impinging on any of the principles of Union law which the CJEU would have it check against.

CMR applies therefore and under relevant English application, neither of the defendants can be sued in England.

Geert.