The Brussels regulations also referred to the Convention on Jurisdiction and the Enforcement of the Civil and Commercial judgment took effect on first March 2002 (Bermann, 34). The aim of this convention is to enforce and make judgments on matters that are related to commercial and civil activities among the member states of the European Union (Frimston, 15).
According to article number 2 of the Brussels regulation, those defendants who are domiciled in any of the states that are in contract should be sued at the location of the domicile (Steiner & Woods, 7). The same article provides the jurisdictions governing a consumer contract in case where a contract is done off a profession (Ludwig, 25). Article sixteen of this act provides an opportunity to a consumer who is domiciled in a contract to sue the offending party before the court of the place where domicile occurs or the court of the other contracting country (Hoskyns & Newman, 14). The Brussels guidelines focus on the protection of the consumers through enforcing such articles when a contract between states results to one of the state suffering (Ludlow, 21). An example of such a case was when Chrysler Canada limited filed a case against Wolfgang Stolzenberg, who was the Caster Group of Companies’ Chief Executive Officer and thirty six other defendants in 1996 (Hix, 29). The case was that, Mr. Wolfgang Stolzenberg along with the other defendants had planned to make investment equivalent to 240 million by fraud using his companies which were already insolvent.
The defendant in this case had lived in London and this was where he was domiciled, but after he moved to Germany later, his domicilary status could therefore not be certain. As a result of this, the writ issued by the plaintiffs could not be considered because at that time Mr. Stolzenberg had already migrated and therefore only six of defendants in England were to be sued (Hix, 13). Judge Rattee J. ruled out that Mr. Stoltenberg was not well served with the writ and therefore, substituted service that was ordered by the plaintiffs was considered valid. The issue that existed in this case was that, the Brussels regulations may have different applicability in a state legal system. As a result of such a circumstance, there is need for the regulations to be applied in the procedural system of a legal system of a state (Pelkman, 12).
According to Steiner & Woods (23) in stressing the measures being take by the EU stated, “The main jurisdictional rule of the Brussels Convention, preserved in the recently adopted EC Council regulation, states that defendants domiciled in a Contracting state, whatever their nationality, shall be sued in the courts of their place of domicile (art. 2)”. For the case where domicile takes place in a third country, the laws governing the both the contracting states should be applied.
The Brussels regulations are very strict on fixed term work of a framework agreement between states (Sward, 28). In this case, the domestic laws of the contracting states involved in such contracts should take responsive measures to prevent the abuse of such contract and provide strict punishments to the offending party. According to clause five (1) of the regulations, the national laws should ensure that a fixed term employment is not terminated indefinitely if the contract was meant to provide permanent jobs (Steiner & Woods, 32). In such a case the entity that misuses the public sector in the case of fixed term employment should face severe punishment from the national law.
Reference List
Bermann, G., 2004. Executive Power in the New European Constitution New York: New York University Press.
Frimston, R., 2003. Brussels IV – The Draft Succession Regulation. London: Russell- Cooke LLP.
Hix, S., 1999. The political system of the European Union. Basingstoke: MacMillan.
Hoskyns, C. & Newman, M., 2000. Democratizing the European Union: Issues for the twenty-first century (Perspectives on Democratization). London: Manchester University Press.
Ludlow, N., 2006. De-commissioning the Empty Chair Crisis: The Community institutions and the crisis. London: London School of Economics.
Ludwig, K., 2007. The Polluter Pays Principle in Community Law: The interpretation of article 130r of the EEC treaty, in focus on European law. London: Graham and Trotman.
Pelkman, J., 2007. The New Approach to Technical Harmonisation and Standardisation. Journal of Common Market Studies. 25: (3), p12.
Steiner, J. & Woods, R., 2003. Textbook on EC Law. London: Oxford University Press.
Sward, W., 2004. Cases and Materials on EU Law. London: Oxford University Press.