Commercial proceedings reformed
Draft laws on commercial courts brought to the State Duma
Russian President brought before the State Duma draft laws on amendments to the Commercial Procedure Code and the Federal constitutional law on commercial (“arbitrazh”) courts. The amendments are required by the forthcoming merger of the Supreme Court and the Supreme Commercial Court. The most remarkable novelties to be introduced into the Commercial Procedure Code are the following:
- the federal commercial courts of circuits shall be called “commercial courts of circuits” (thus the word “federal” is omitted);
- the second cassation instance above them shall be the Division for Economic Disputes of the Supreme Court;- commercial courts, save the Court for Intellectual Rights, shall no longer review the legality of normative acts;
- decisions on the submission of cases to the Presidium of the Supreme Court by way of supervision shall be rendered by a single judge of the Supreme Court, not a panel of three judges, as was before;
- the publication of dissenting opinions by judges of the court of last resort is no longer envisaged;
- the Chairman of the Supreme Court and his deputies shall have the right to submit to the Presidium requests as to the reversal of any court decision on the ground of a fundamental misinterpretation of laws; unlike the analogous power which has for a long while existed in the Civil Procedure Code, in this draft law their right to make such requests is not limited by any time period;
- it is provided that the reasoned part of court decision may contain references to those judgments of the Plenary Session and of the Presidium of the Supreme Commercial Court which remain in force; it is not explained, however, which of them shall remain in force.
Some light on this question is shed by amendments to the Federal constitutional law on commercial (“arbitrazh”) courts: it runs that explanations on the issues of court practice given by the Plenary Session of the Supreme Commercial Court shall remain in force till the moment of adoption of corresponding decisions by the Plenary Session of the Supreme Court; nothing is said, however, on the precedents made by the Presidium of the Supreme Commercial Court.
The text of draft law on the amendments to the Federal constitutional law on commercial (“arbitrazh”) courts can be found here.