United Kingdom

Subscribe to United Kingdom via RSS

On 29 October 2010, the Law Commission published an Issues Paper on whether the requirement for a formal marine policy under section 22 of the Marine Insurance Act 1906 should be repealed. Section 22 states that a contract of marine insurance will be inadmissible in evidence unless it is “embodied in a marine policy“. …
Read More UK: Law Commission Publishes Issues Paper 9 Proposing Repeal of the Need for a Formal Marine Policy

Underwriters can be ordered to disclose documents related to an application against them for a third party costs order under the Senior Courts Act s.51(3). In Owners and/or Demises Charterers of the Dredger Kamal XXIV v Owners of the Ship Ariela and Ors [2010] EWHC 2531 (Comm), the underwriters had been used by the insured as part of the mechanism for achieving fraud and under the circumstances it was held that a disclosure order was appropriate. …
Read More UK: Underwriters Obliged to Disclose Confidential Documents Following Fraud by Third Party

Garnat Trading & Shipping (Singapore) PTE LTD (Garnat) and Vung Tau Shipbuilding Industry Joint-Stock Company (Vung Tau) v Baominh Insurance Corporation (Baominh) [2010] EWHC 2578 (Comm), concerned the loss of a floating dock (carrying a floating workshop) which sank in the course of being towed on a voyage from Vladivostok in Russia to Vung Tau in Vietnam. …
Read More UK: Marine Insurance – Non-Disclosure and Seaworthiness

In Clinton David Jacobs v Motor Insurance Bureau [2010] EWCA Civ 1208, the Court of Appeal held that where a person is injured by an uninsured driver and is entitled to recover from the Motor Insurers Bureau (MIB), that person is entitled to recover damages assessed according to English law, rather than the law where the accident occurred. …
Read More UK: Court of Appeal Rules on Assessment of Damages for Personal Injury in Motor Accidents

In a report published in January 2009, the Competition Commission proposed a prohibition on the sale of payment protection insurance policies (PPI) at the point of sale (see our earlier blogs on the topic, including here). Following a legal challenge by Barclays Bank Plc to the proposed prohibition, the Competition Appeal Tribunal asked the Competition Commission to reconsider the advantages and disadvantages of its proposed remedies package. …
Read More UK Regulation: Competition Commission Confirms its Point of Sale Prohibition in Respect of Payment Protection Insurance

In William McIlroy Swindon Ltd & Rannoch Investments Ltd v Quinn Insurance Ltd [2010] EWHC 2448 (TCC), the High Court was asked to consider, as a preliminary issue, when a dispute could be said to have arisen for the purposes of an arbitration clause that provided that any dispute as to the insurer’s liability was to be referred to arbitration within nine months, failing which the claim would be deemed to have been abandoned. …
Read More UK: High Court Provides Clarity on Time Limits in Arbitration Clauses

On 14 October 2010 the UK Government announced its intention to change the institutional framework for enforcement of competition (antitrust) and consumer protection law in the UK.  At present, the UK has a dual agency system consisting of the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and the Competition Commission (the Commission). …
Read More UK: Government Announces Plans to Change Institutional Framework for the Enforcement of Competition (Antitrust) and Consumer Protection Law