Australia to accede to Hague Convention on Service Abroad
On 25 June 2009, the Commonwealth Attorney General tabled the Hague Convention on Service Abroad of Judicial and Extrajudicial Documents in Civil and Commercial Matters 1965 in Parliament. This is the first step to Australia’s becoming a party to the Convention. In anticipation of that, there have been amendments to the rules of the Federal Court and those of the State Supreme Courts (see eg Victoria) relating to service under the Convention, which will commence on the day the Convention enters force in Australia.
Well, nearly. It is slightly premature to say that Australia has acceded. Australia still has yet to deposit its instrument of accession with the depository, and its accession must not be objected to by any other ratifying State within a further six months.
Does anyone have information on New Zealand preparing to accede to the Hague Evidence Convention of 1970?
The new Evidence Act of NZ apparently takes care for NZ applying the Convention, but will NZ accede (or has it already)?
Thank you very much!
I would note that, as far as I can see, Australia has still not yet implemented the convention.
Australia acceded to the Convention on 15 March 2010 and it is to enter into force on 1 November 2010: see http://www.ag.gov.au/www/agd/agd.nsf/Page/Internationalcivilprocedure_ServiceofforeigncourtprocessinAustralia. As I noted in the original post, court rules have been amended in anticipation of this, with the amendments to commence when the Convention enters into force.