For Bermuda read Florida
For Bermuda read Florida
IT’S an ill wind that blows nobody any good, and it was certainly an ill wind which blew the Fall Meeting of the US Maritime Law Association off course – all the way from Bermuda to Florida. But there are worse places to be than Florida – many worse – and it hardly seems like a hardship to spend a few days at the Boca Raton Resort & Club.
Above all, we should congratulate the US MLA on its ability to move so quickly in organising, at the drop of a hat, an alternative venue for such a massive gathering of people, with its attendant business, sporting and social events. Most importantly, USMLA has not allowed the forces of force majeure to blow away its proper sense of priorities. The outdoor activities will go ahead in Boca Raton on the same dates as originally planned, and registrants are “encouraged to bring their families to the meeting”.
Lawyer are often accused of getting their priorities wrong. Not these ones.
SMA rules
THE Society of Maritime Arbitrators has published its revised rulebook, the fourth of its kind. It contains nothing sinister. Indeed, it seems that the SMA and maritime bar made such a good job of the last revision, in 1994, that little needed to be changed. Now included are the updated rules for shortened arbitration procedures and those for mediation, and the standard terms for administering escrow funds. Add some small amendments to the language of a paragraph about consolidation and a sentence covering the notice of appointment to arbitrators, and bob’s your auntie. Which is just as well, since the preamble to the rules now states that all references to arbitrators are deemed ‘gender neutral’.
In neutral
GENDER-neutral or not, we can think of no better observation made about arbitrators in recent years than the one penned in this magazine by Manfred Arnold, who writes, “If there is concern that arbitrators are not consistent or predictable in their procedural/administrative approaches, the parties or their counsel should voice their concerns and invite changes. Arbitrators must keep in mind that the process was not created for the benefit of the arbitrators, but it represents a form of dispute resolution in which arbitrators are the facilitators and not the principals. “
Paris arbitration
THE Maritime Arbitration Chamber of Paris (CAMP) has just published the second issue of its internet newsletter. In it, Henry Page, an English solicitor with Penningtons, claims that the arbitration procedure in Paris is faster and cheaper than that in London. He adds for good measure that Paris arbitration is less formal without suffering in terms of efficiency and reliability. For some people, of course, it will also have to be in English, unlike the CAMP newsletter.
Multimodal guidance
MULTIMODAL transport is arguably one of the more arcane aspects of the maritime industries, although it has plenty of competition for that distinction. But help is at hand for those who would like to improve their knowledge.
Bart Neervoort, of Van Traa Advocaten in the Netherlands, tells us that, during last month’s San Francisco conference of the International Bar Association, the land transport committee discussed multimodal project transport. He says, “Much to my shame, I must confess that only when preparing my paper for that committee meeting did I come across the 2001 UNCTAD Report on the Implementation of Multimodal Transport Rules with Comparative Table of Regional/Sub-regional Laws and Regulations.
“The report is absolutely fantastic, because it gives easy access to the laws and regulations of a great number of countries/regions which apply to multimodal transport. But when I mentioned this to the audience, and said that the report can be downloaded from UNCTAD, I noticed quite a few people scribbling the information onto a piece of paper. In order to help others, you may wish to publish this information in your newsletter.
“You could also inform your readers that the UNCTAD secretariat recently published a report on the Feasibility of an International Legal Instrument for Multimodal Transport (new to me as well), which can also be downloaded from the UNCTAD site.”
Cadwallader lecture
THE Captain’s Room at Lloyd’s is not what it used to be. The room in the old building had a lot of wood and brass and tradition and chocolate digestives that didn’t transfer over to the other side of London’s Lime Street. But the Captain’s Room was certainly the place to be last month for the Sixth Cadwallader Memorial Lecture, which is the closest thing shipping gets to a sell-out show.
The title of this year’s lecture was “Challenges Facing the Shipping Industry in the 21st Century”, which gave chairman William O’Neil, and panellists Chris Horrocks, Fotis Karamitsos and Peter Swift, plenty to get their teeth into.
The lecture covered a wide-ranging remit, and gave a vivid illustration of why, although everyone in shipping wants the same thing (safe ships, clean seas, efficient transport), they can never agree on how to get it. The organisers, though, would do well to remember that the mind can only absorb what the seat can endure. The canapes, meanwhile, were excellent, as was the company.