Thank you to Francesca Petronio and Fabio Cozzi for pointing out relevant new rules of Italian civil procedure prima facie raising issues under the special jurisdictional rules of the Brussels I-Regulation. The changes (introduced earlier in the year) aim to increase the expertise of specialised courts where foreign companies are involved as either plaintiff or defendant. (Only) in the event of special jurisdictional rules, however, the Brussels I regulation does not just identify the courts of a specific Member State as having jurisdiction: it identifies one specific court within that Member State. Court specialisation (such as in the Italian rules, for antitrust cases) would seem to run counter that rule, even if well intended.
All we have to do is to wait for a disgruntled plaintiff or defendant to take issue with the court specialisation where this overlaps with the special jurisdictional rules.
Geert.
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