Lloyd's Maritime and Commercial Law Quarterly
BOOK REVIEW - COMMERCIAL ARBITRATION
Judge-Arbitrators1
D. Rhidian Thomas,
Senior Lecturer in Law, School of Law, University of East Anglia.
Introduction
The recent arbitral award of Mr Justice Staughton which has been publicised and disseminated as The Bamburi
[1982] 1 Lloyd’s Rep. 312, has focused attention on the little used, and possibly little known, statutory power whereunder it is open to a judge of the Commercial Court to take up an appointment as an arbitrator or umpire. When acting in such a capacity the judge is styled a judge-arbitrator or judge-umpire.2 The award in The Bamburi would also appear to be the first judicial arbitral award to be published and put into circulation in the same manner as a judicial precedent.
The statutory power is enacted in the Administration of Justice Act 1970, s. 4, which provides:
- (1) A judge of the Commercial Court may, if in all the circumstances he thinks fit, accept appointment as sole arbitrator, or as umpire, by or by virtue of an arbitration agreement within the meaning of the Arbitration Act 1950, where the dispute appears to him to be of a commercial character.
- (2) A judge of the Commercial Court shall not accept appointment as arbitrator or umpire unless the Lord Chief Justice has informed him that, having regard to the state of business in the High Court and [in the Crown Court3], he can be made available to do so.
- (3) The fees payable for the services of a judge as arbitrator or umpire shall be taken in the High Court.
- (4) Schedule 3 to this Act shall have effect for modifying, and in certain cases replacing, provisions of the Arbitration Act 1950, in relation to arbitration by judges and, in particular, for substituting the Court of Appeal for the High Court in provisions of that Act whereby arbitrators and umpires, their proceedings and awards, are subject to control and review by the court.
- (5) Any juristiction which is exercisable by the High Court in relation to arbitrators and umpires otherwise than under the Arbitration Act 1950 shall, in relation to a judge of the Commercial Court appointed as arbitrator or umpire, be exercisable instead by the Court of Appeal.
1 I would like to record my appreciation for the assistance I have received in the preparation of this article from His Honour Mr Justice Lloyd, judge in charge of the Commercial Court; Mr David M. Bird, Clerk to the Commercial Court; and Mr B. W. Vigrass, Director and Secretary of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators.
2 For the definition of these terms see Administration of Justice Act 1970, Sched. 3, cl. 1(e).
3 Amended by Courts Act 1971, s. 56 and Sched. 8, cl. 60(1).
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