Latest changes in the Legal System

The various specialist civil courts in England and Wales will be reorganised and be officially known as the “Business and Property Courts of England and Wales” from June 2017. They will handle, amongst other matters, international dispute resolution jurisdictions. The courts included within the Business and Property Courts will be as follows:

• The Commercial Court which will continue to cover all its existing subject areas of shipping, sale of goods, insurance and reinsurance etc.
• The Admiralty Court.
• The Mercantile Court.
• The Technology and Construction Court which deals with major technology and construction cases.
• The Financial List which deals with all banking and financial market issues.
• The Companies and Insolvency Court.
• The Patents Court.
• The Intellectual Property and Enterprise Court.
• The Competition List.

The new structure will provide more flexibility while preserving the practices and procedures of these courts. Judges with suitable expertise and experience will be able to cross-deploy so as to be able to sit on cases where their expertise can be best utilised. The current situation means that judges who are experts in a particular legal field are not readily available to sit in cases in that area in another court, so, highly expert competition law judges in the Queen’s Bench Division cannot easily sit on the bulk of competition law cases that take place in the Chancery Division.

The overall intention is to enhance the U.K.’s reputation for international dispute resolution and to ensure that the U.K. continues to provide the best business court-based dispute resolution service in the post Brexit world. Business and Property Courts will be set up in Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Leeds and Manchester, initially with planned future courts in Newcastle and Liverpool and these courts will enhance the connections between Business and Property work carried out both outside and within London.