In [2018] EWHC 1343 (Comm) Nori Holdings v Otkritie Males J follows exactly the same line as mine in commenting on West Tankers – specifically the bodged attempt in Brussels I Recast to accommodate the concerns over West Tankers’ sailing the Brussels I ship way too far into arbitral shores.
For my general discussion of the issues see here. A timeline:
- When the Council came up with its first draft of what became more or less verbatim the infamous recital 12 I was not enthusiastic.
- When Wathelet AG in his Opinion in Gazprom suggested recital 12 did overturn West Tankers, I was not convinced. (Most of those supporting this view read much into recital 12 first para’s instruction that the Regulation does not impede courts’ power ‘from referring the parties to arbitration’).
- Indeed the CJEU’s judgment in Gazprom did not commit itself either way (seeing as it did not entertain the new Regulation).
- Cooke J was on the right track in Toyota v Prolat: in his view the Recast did not change West Tankers.
- Males J confirms: West Tankers is still good authority. At 69 ff he does not just point out that Wathelet was not followed by the Court. 92 ff he adds five more reasons not to follow the suggestion that West Tankers has been overruled. He concludes ‘that there is nothing in the Recast Regulation to cast doubt on the continuing validity of the decision in West Tankers (Case C-185/07) [2009] AC 1138 which remains an authoritative statement of EU law’.
I agree.
Geert.
(Handbook of) EU Private International Law, 2nd ed. 2016, Heading 2.2.2.10.2.