Commercial Arbitration Act 2011 (Tas)

Commercial Arbitration Act 2011

An Act relating to the conduct of commercial arbitrations, to repeal the Commercial Arbitration Act 1986 and for other purposes [Royal Assent 16 June 2011]

Be it enacted by His Excellency the Governor of Tasmania, by and with the advice and consent of the Legislative Council and House of Assembly, in Parliament assembled, as follows:

PART 1A - Preliminary

Note Sections of this Act that contain a reference to the "Model Law" in the heading are substantially the same as the provisions of the UNCITRAL Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration (as adopted by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law on 21 June 1985 with amendments as adopted by that Commission in 2006) so as to be as uniform as possible with the UNCITRAL Model Law. Some changes have been made to those provisions of the Act based on the UNCITRAL Model Law to amend or supplement the provisions in their application to domestic arbitrations in Tasmania or to accommodate modern drafting styles and conventions (for example, provisions are drafted in gender neutral terms and archaisms are replaced with modern alternatives). Notes draw attention to substantive changes. The original numbering of the "articles" of the UNCITRAL Model Law has been retained but converted to references to "sections" and articles containing more than one sentence have been reformatted into subsections. There are a number of additional provisions to those based on the UNCITRAL Model Law.

1A. Short title This Act may be cited as the Commercial Arbitration Act 2011 .

1B. Commencement The provisions of this Act commence on a day or days to be proclaimed.

1C. Paramount object of Act (1) The paramount object of this Act is to facilitate the fair and final resolution of commercial disputes by impartial arbitral tribunals without unnecessary delay or expense. (2) This Act aims to achieve its paramount object by – (a) enabling parties to agree about how their commercial disputes are to be resolved (subject to subsection (3) and such safeguards as are necessary in the public interest); and (b) providing arbitration procedures that enable commercial disputes to be resolved in a cost-effective manner, informally and quickly. (3) This Act must be interpreted, and the functions of an arbitral tribunal must be exercised, so that (as far as practicable) the paramount object of this Act is achieved. (4) Subsection (3) does not affect the operation of section 8A of the Acts Interpretation Act 1931 .