Spiliada Maritime Corp v Cansulex Ltd
Encyclopedia
Spiliada Maritime Corp v Cansulex Ltd [1986] 3 WLR 972, 3 All ER 843, [1987] A.C. 460 is a leading decision of the House of Lords
on the doctrine of forum non conveniens
.
was loaded onto two ships docked in British Columbia
causing damage to them. An action was brought in England by the Liberian owners of the "Spiliada" for the damage to the ship against the sulfur exporter. The owners of the second ship, the "Cambridgeshire" also brought an action in England. Both ships were insured by English insurers.
The plaintiffs applied for leave to serve the defendants ex juris. The trial judge granted leave. The defendant successfully appealed. The Court of Appeal held that the expenses alone and the existence of a B.C. limitation period was NOT enough to allow the claim to come to England.
Lord Goff
, writing for the House of Lords, granted the appeal.
Goff reviewed the area of law. A judge may decline to take a case where there is another jurisdiction that is more suitable for the parties. However, the burden is on the claimant to establish that the foreign forum is clearly or distinctly better. Many factors can be considered to determine the "natural forum" including the availability of witnesses, the applicable law of the matter, the parties' residence or place of business, and the possibility for the plaintiff to obtain justice in the foreign jurisdiction. If a party makes out a claim for a natural forum the opposing side may rebut the claim by showing that justice requires the matter to be heard in the domestic court, otherwise justice would not be done.
House of Lords
The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster....
on the doctrine of forum non conveniens
Forum non conveniens
Forum non conveniens is a common law legal doctrine whereby courts may refuse to take jurisdiction over matters where there is a more appropriate forum available to the parties...
.
Facts
Wet sulfurSulfur
Sulfur or sulphur is the chemical element with atomic number 16. In the periodic table it is represented by the symbol S. It is an abundant, multivalent non-metal. Under normal conditions, sulfur atoms form cyclic octatomic molecules with chemical formula S8. Elemental sulfur is a bright yellow...
was loaded onto two ships docked in British Columbia
British Columbia
British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...
causing damage to them. An action was brought in England by the Liberian owners of the "Spiliada" for the damage to the ship against the sulfur exporter. The owners of the second ship, the "Cambridgeshire" also brought an action in England. Both ships were insured by English insurers.
The plaintiffs applied for leave to serve the defendants ex juris. The trial judge granted leave. The defendant successfully appealed. The Court of Appeal held that the expenses alone and the existence of a B.C. limitation period was NOT enough to allow the claim to come to England.
Judgment
Prior to the decision of the House of Lords in The Spiliada an application for a stay or dismissal of proceedings falling within the proper jurisdiction of the court could only be granted on very narrow grounds. As previously reiterated in Baroda v Wildenstein [1972] 2 All ER 689 , the court could only stay the proceedings on the grounds that the suit was "oppressive, vexatious or an abuse of process" and that "the stay would not cause an injustice to the plaintiff" (quoting St Pierre v South American Stores (Gath & Chaves) [1935] All ER Rep 408).Lord Goff
Robert Goff, Baron Goff of Chieveley
Robert Lionel Archibald Goff, Baron Goff of Chieveley PC DCL FBA is a retired British Judge.Lord Goff, High Steward of the University of Oxford, retired in 1998 as Senior Law Lord after more than a decade as a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary in the House of Lords...
, writing for the House of Lords, granted the appeal.
Goff reviewed the area of law. A judge may decline to take a case where there is another jurisdiction that is more suitable for the parties. However, the burden is on the claimant to establish that the foreign forum is clearly or distinctly better. Many factors can be considered to determine the "natural forum" including the availability of witnesses, the applicable law of the matter, the parties' residence or place of business, and the possibility for the plaintiff to obtain justice in the foreign jurisdiction. If a party makes out a claim for a natural forum the opposing side may rebut the claim by showing that justice requires the matter to be heard in the domestic court, otherwise justice would not be done.