Case Alert - [2017] EWHC 2753 (Comm)
Whether lawyer can be an arbitrator where requirement is for
"not less than 10 years' experience of insurance or
reinsurance"
The reinsurance contract entered into by the parties contained
an arbitration agreement which provided that "unless the
parties otherwise agree, the arbitration tribunal shall consist of
persons with not less than ten years' experience of insurance
or reinsurance".
Following a dispute, the respondents appointed Mr Alistair
Schaff QC. The claimant accepted that Mr Schaff has considerably
more than 10 years' experience of insurance or reinsurance law,
but said that that was not the same as "experience of
insurance or reinsurance", within the meaning of the
arbitration clause. It sought to rely on the unreported decision of
Morison J in Company X v Company Y [2000] (a case which the judge
in this case accepted was fairly well known in the reinsurance
market) in which the judge held that the phrase meant
