20.01 The problem of jurisdiction in the United Kingdom

Several linked problems arise from the fact that the United Kingdom is not a unitary State or a single legal area. Legally speaking, it has only ever been a disUnited Kingdom; politically speaking it may be about to become a dissolved Kingdom. This Chapter is positioned between Part B and the Lugano rules properly so called, which would operate to give jurisdiction to the courts of the United Kingdom, and Part C, the jurisdictional rules which apply within the United Kingdom in matters to which the Lugano Convention does not, for whatever reason, apply. This reflects the fact that a single set of statutory rules has been used, and (if the Lugano Convention re-enters into effect for the United Kingdom) may continue to be used for these two, distinct and different, categories of case. This Chapter seeks to tie up some loose ends left untied by the Lugano Convention in Part B; and it shows how much the same set of rules is used to answer the ‘in London or in Edinburgh?’ question of jurisdiction in cases to which the Lugano Convention does not apply at all, and which are otherwise dealt with in Part C.