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Diplomat Lawyer (Secretary) Vacancy at the Permanent Bureau of the HCCH
The Permanent Bureau of the Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH) is seeking to fill a Diplomat Lawyer (Secretary) position. The deadline for applications is 31 December 2018 (12.00 a.m. CET). For more information, click here.
Given diversity of geographic representation and of legal expertise requirements as set out in the HCCH Statute, candidates should preferably not have (exclusively) Swiss, Canadian, Italian, Portuguese, or Singaporean nationality. Currently, there are Diplomat Lawyers of those nationalities at the HCCH.
As announced, “[t]he main priorities for this position currently include the ongoing parentage/surrogacy project and the work relating to the HCCH Convention of 29 May 1993 on Protection of Children and Co-operation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption. This said, the successful candidate will be expected to work on any other project or file that the work programme of the HCCH and related resource allocation may require (be it in relation to post-Convention services or the development of legislative projects).”
IAFL European Chapter Young Lawyers Award 2019
Approximately eight years ago, the European Chapter of the International Academy of Family Lawyers (“IAFL”) established a writing award for young family lawyers to be awarded on an annual basis. The award aims to promote research and excellence among young family lawyers and to increase awareness among other legal professionals of the work and objectives of the IAFL. The Young Lawyers Award carries a prize of €1,000, awarded to the author of the winning contribution, and two €500 prizes for the best runners up. For more information, please click here.
No fake news: the Netherlands Commercial Court proposal approved!
By Georgia Antonopoulou, Erlis Themeli, and Xandra Kramer, Erasmus University Rotterdam (PhD candidate, postdoc researcher, and PI ERC consolidator project Building EU Civil Justice)
Today, the Dutch Senate (Eerste Kamer) finally voted in favour of the legislative proposal for the establishment of the Netherlands Commercial Court (NCC) (see here). As of 11 December 2018, the Netherlands is added to the countries that have created an English language court or chamber specialized in international commercial disputes, including Singapore and France.
The proposal was already approved by the House of Representatives (Tweede Kamer) on 8 March 2018 (see our previous blogpost). Shortly after, we optimistically reported that the bill was scheduled for rubber-stamping by the Senate on 27 March 2018, making it realistic that the NCC would open its doors on 1 July 2018. However, not all senators were convinced by the need for and the modalities of the NCC proposal and it led to heated debates.
The discussions geared primarily around the cost-effective court fees and the fear for a two-tiered justice system (see Report of the meeting of 4 December 2018). The court fees are much higher than in other cases: 15.000 Euros in first instance and 20.000 Euros for appeal proceedings at the NCCA. It was argued that the cost-covering nature of the NCC fees is at odds with the current Dutch court fee system and that it may create and obstacle for small and medium-sized businesses to access the NCC. In response to these objections, the Dutch Minister of Justice and Security emphasized the importance of the NCC for the Netherlands as a trade country, the high quality of the Dutch civil justice system that was nevertheless unattractive due to the Dutch language, and pointed to the establishment of similar courts in other countries. He underlined that the NCC is only available in cross-border cases, that it offers an additional forum that parties can choose while the ordinary courts are still available, and that the court fees are relatively low compared to arbitration or to the fees for commercial courts in several other countries, including the London Commercial Court.
Information on the NCC, a presentation of the court – a chamber of the Amsterdam District Court – and the Rules of Procedure are available on the website of the Dutch judiciary.
The Minister of Justice and Security will issue a decree soon announcing the date of entry into force of the NCC legislation, but in any case the NCC will open its doors early 2019.