Hubei High People’s Court formulated the Guiding Opinions on Regulating the Judicial Review of Arbitration in November 2020.
On 25 Nov. 2020, Hubei High People's court formulated and issued the Guiding Opinions of Hubei High People's Court on Regulating Judicial Review of Arbitration to Support the Healthy Development of Arbitration (Trial) (“the Guiding Opinions”, 湖北省高級人民法院關于規范仲裁司法審查支持仲裁事業健康發展的指導意見(試行)) and Guidelines of Hubei Courts for the Adjudication of Judicial Review Cases for Arbitration (Trial) (“the Guidelines”, 湖北法院仲裁司法審查案件審理指南(試行)), to clarify the application of law in the judicial review of arbitration, as well as to unify the judgment criteria and to standardize the procedures.
The Guiding Opinions and the Guidelines require people’s courts at all levels in Hubei Province to comply with the following requirements:
Firstly, the courts shall fully understand the function of arbitration as a means of non-litigation dispute resolution.
Secondly, the courts shall implement the judicial review system of arbitration. The courts shall fully respect the party autonomy, and conduct judicial review in strict compliance with the Civil Procedure Law, the Arbitration Law, the New York Convention and the statutory justifications provided in the SPC’s judicial interpretations concerning the arbitration; and designate specific tribunals (a collegial panel(s)) for foreign-related commercial cases to handle judicial review cases of arbitration.
Thirdly, they shall improve the working mechanism of supporting and supervising the arbitration, establish a centralized management platform for the data and information of arbitration judicial review cases, unify the law application standards of arbitration judicial review cases throughout the Hubei Province, and standardize the procedures such as the determination of the validity of arbitration agreements, the enforcement of cases, the preservation, the revocation of arbitration awards and the refusal for enforcing arbitration awards.
Contributors: Yanru Chen 陳彥茹
