ENGLAND & WALES Law and Practice Contributed by: Damian Taylor, Olga Ladrowska, Lawal Ijaodola and Eleanor Higginson, Slaughter and May
13.4 Procedure for Enforcing Domestic and Foreign Arbitration The Arbitration Act 1996 sets out a summary procedure for the enforcement of domestic and foreign arbitral awards, which provides, among other things, that an arbitral award may by leave of the court be enforced in the same manner as a judgment or order of the court. The enforcing party will need to apply to the court for permis- sion by submitting an arbitration claim form, attaching a witness statement, the award and the arbitration agreement. This is generally done without giving notice to the other party. If per- mission to enforce is granted, a judgment will be entered in the terms of the award and the same powers that are available to enforce an ordinary court judgment will be available. Where a party can show that a tribunal lacks substantive juris- diction to make an award, leave to enforce will be refused. To enforce a foreign award under the New York Convention 1958, a party should follow the pro- cedure set out in the Arbitration Act 1996. This requires the enforcing party to produce the duly authenticated award or a duly certified copy of the award and the original arbitration agreement or a duly certified copy of it. If an award is in a foreign language, a certified translation of it should also be produced. Enforcement of a New York Convention award may be resisted on the limited grounds set out in the New York Conven- tion 1958 or on public policy grounds. 14. Outlook 14.1 Proposals for Dispute Resolution Reform One example of a recent proposal for dispute resolution reform is the Arbitration Bill 2024, which seeks to reform the Arbitration Act 1996
and is currently before Parliament. The Bill aims to ensure that the Arbitration Act 1996 remains fit for purpose and continues to promote Eng- land and Wales as a leading destination for commercial arbitration. It reflects proposals made by the Law Commission in 2023 following an extensive consultation with legal practition- ers, industry bodies and arbitral institutions in the jurisdiction. Following that consultation, the Law Commission concluded that the Arbitration Act 1996 works well and that there is no need for wide-ranging reforms. The reforms in the Arbitration Bill 2024 are therefore confined to a few major initiatives and tidy-up changes, which include introducing a new default provision as to the governing law of an arbitration agreement. Separately, as explained in 2.1 Third-Party Liti- gation Funding , the government has commis- sioned a review into third-party litigation funding, which is due to report in summer 2025. It may recommend greater regulation of the sector. 14.2 Growth Areas Group claims and class actions have undergone rapid development and expansion in recent years, fuelled in large part by the introduction of an opt-out class action regime for competition law claims in 2015 (see 3.7 Representative or Collective Actions ) and the rise of third-party funding (see 2. Litigation Funding ). Claimant law firms’ and litigation funders’ confidence in the competition class action regime is evident from the large number of claims filed in the Competi- tion Appeal Tribunal in recent years. Crucially, developments are not limited to the competition sphere. Group claims and class actions are becoming an increasingly attractive and feasible means of redress across a broad range of sectors and in relation to a variety of issues. For example, the past few years have
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