A UK appellate court recently dismissed a French insurer’s jurisdictional challenge to a lawsuit initiated against it by an English insurer. After settling a personal injury claim, the French insurer sought to recover $2.45 million from the English insurer as its proportionate share of the settlement. The English insurer, however, denied coverage for the claim, and commenced proceedings in England for a declaration of non-liability. In response, the French insurer argued that the English court lacked jurisdiction because of an arbitration clause in the insurance policy that required all disputes to be arbitrated in Paris. It further noted that European Union Regulation 44/2001 has an arbitration exclusion that precluded English jurisdiction. The lower court rejected this argument, and the French insurer appealed.
The appellate court rejected the French insurers’ jurisdictional argument, holding that—under the EU Regulation—both the subject matter of the claim and the preliminary issue of the enforceability of the arbitration clause were within the English court’s jurisdiction. The court reasoned that “the mere fact that a claim is the subject of an arbitration agreement does not deprive a court of its jurisdiction to determine the dispute.” Rather, a court has to look at the subject matter of the proceeding to decide whether it is within the scope of the arbitration agreement or the EU Regulation. Applying this standard, the court found that the English insurer’s claim did not arise from the insurance policy’s arbitration agreement; instead, it arose out of a separate liability agreement between the co-insurers. Youell v. La Reunion Aerienne [2009] EWCA Civ 175.
This post written by John Black.