Conflict of laws: declaratory judgments

The jurisdiction in which an insurance case is heard is often critical to the outcome, as the court will apply its own choice of law rules to the contract and those rules may point to an applicable law whose content is quite different from that of English law. Jurisdictional battles are thus fought with some intensity.

In Faraday Reinsurance Co Ltd v Howden North America Inc and Others [2012] EWCA Civ 980; [2012] Lloyd’s Rep IR 631 the Court of Appeal has upheld the first instance judgment of Beatson J, [2011] EWHC 2837 (Comm), and maintained the grant of permission for service outside the jurisdiction so that a dispute as to the meaning of an insurance contract could be determined by the English courts in accordance with English choice of law principles and – almost certainly – English law.