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Article 8 Hague Maintenance Convention 1973 Set Aside in Favour of Party Autonomy: One Step too Far Supreme Court (Hoge Road), 21 February 1997

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 May 2009

M. Sumampouw
M. Sumampouw
Affiliation:
Former Head of the P.I.L. Department, T.M.C. Asser Instituut
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Type
Netherlands Judicial Decisions Involving Questions of Private International Law
Information
Netherlands International Law Review , Volume 45 , Issue 1 , May 1998 , pp. 115 - 128
Copyright
Copyright © T.M.C. Asser Press 1998

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References

1. M. Pelichet, Note on the operation of the Hague Conventions relating to maintenance obligations and the New York Convention on the Recovery Abroad of Maintenance; Hague Conference on Private International Law, Preliminary Document No. 1 of 1 September 1995 for the attention of the Special Commission of November 1995.

2. Bureau Permanent de la Conférence, ed., Conférence de La Haye de droit international privé. Actes et Documents de la Douzième Session 2 au 21 octobre 1972, Tome IV: Obligations Alimentaires(The Hague 1975) pp. 303, 304, 305, 307, 358–359, 372.

3. Compare, J.W. Soek, in M. Sumampouw, ed., Les nouvelles conventions de La Haye, Vol. III (Dordrecht, Martinus Nijhoff 1984) pp. 179–181 [The titles of paragraphs 1.1. and 1.2. are mistakenly switched, M.S.]; M. Sumampouw, in idem, Vol. IV (1994) pp. 47–56; E.N. Frohn, in idem, Vol. V (1996) pp. 35–50.

4. Compare, vanLoon, J.H.A., ‘The Hague Conventions on Private lnternational Law’, in Jacobs, F.G.J. and Roberts, S., eds., The Effect of Treaties in Domestic Law (London, Sweet & Maxwell 1987) pp. 221–251 at pp. 237 and 238.Google Scholar

5. The title of the extensive annotation of the Hoge Raad's opinion by P. Vlas, ‘Rechtskeuze op postdivortiële alimentatie: een Hollandse verlegenheidsoplossing’ [Party Autonomy to Maintenance After Divorce: a Dutch For-Want-of-a-Better Solution], 46 Ars Aequi (1997) pp. 800–827, is indeed wholly apposite to the said opinion.

6. Art. 27: ‘Internal law and observance of treaties. A party may not invoke the provision of its internal law as justification for its failure to perform a treaty…’

7. Actes et documents, op. cit. n. 2, at p. 83. See also the Explanatory Report of M. Verwilghen, in Actes et documents, op. cit. n. 2, pp. 432–465 at pp. 447–448, no. 152. Compare also the Governmental replies to the questionnaire (Preliminary Document No. 1) from Germany, Austria, France, Greece, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, in idem, pp. 55, 56, 61, 62, 65, 66 and 69.

8. Actes et documents, op. cit. n. 2, atp. 88. See also the Explanatory Report of M. Verwilghen, loc. cit. n. 7, at pp. 447–448, no. 152.

9. Actes et documents, op. cit. n. 2, at pp. 27–28, 119–120 (nos. 63–65), 282, 285, 287, 289, 291–294, 302–307, 310, 311, 317–319, 333, 354–356, 358, 359, 372, 373.

10. Compare also, Vlas, loc. cit. n. 5, at p. 827.

11. See n. 9.

12. Vlas, loc. cit. n. 5, at pp. 826–827.

13. As far as the Dutch legislature is concerned, it is hard to sustain that it was unaware of the evolution of party autonomy in the field of family law, when it ratified the Convention in December 1980. At the Thirteenth Session of the Hague Conference, the Netherlands took part in drafting the Hague Convention on the Law Applicable to Matrimonial Property Regimes of 14 March 1978, which Convention provides party autonomy as the main rule (Art. 3).

14. Final Act of the Seventeenth Session, under Part B, 5a, in Permanent Bureau of the Conference, ed., Hague Conference on Private International Law. Proceedings of the Seventeenth Session 10 to 29 May 1993, Tome I – First Part (The Hague 1995) p. 45. As regards the initiators of said decision, see Pelichet, op. cit. n. 1, at pp. 7–8.

15. Pelichet, op. cit. n. 1.

16. Hague Conference on Private International Law, Preliminary Document No.10 of May 1996 for the attention of the Eighteenth Session: General Conclusions of the Special Commission of November 1995 on the Operation of the Hague Conventions relating to Maintenance Obligations and the New York Convention of 20 June 1956 on the Recovery Abroad of Maintenance, drawn by the Permanent Bureau of the Conference, pp. 19, 21, 27.

17. Hague Conference on Private International Law, Eighteenth Session, Final Act, The Hague, 19 October 1996, under Part B, 7a, p. 21.

18. Compare, Van Loon, op. cit. n. 4, at pp. 238–239.

19. Supporting the opinion of the Hoge Raad: K. Boele-Woelki, AAe Katern 63, June 1997, pp. 2997–2998; idem, ‘Artikel 8 Haags Alimentatieverdrag 1973 staat op de tocht’ [Article 8 of the Hague Maintenance Convention 1973 in critical condition], 19 FJR (1997) p. 133; idem, ‘Atikel 8 Haager Unterhaltsabkommen steht einer Rechtswahl nicht entgegen’ [Article 8 Hague Maintenance Convention does not preclude party autonomy], 18 IPRax 1998 no. 3; L.Th.L.G. Pellis, ‘Enige aspecten van rechtskeuze in het internationale alimentatierecht’ [Some Aspects of Party Autonomy in International Maintenance Law], 128 WPNR(1997) pp. 527–530. Critical about the opinion: Vlas, loc. cit. n. 5.

20. See also Vlas, loc. cit. n. 5, at p. 827, and Boele-Woelki, loc. cit. n. 19, 19 FJR (1997) p. 133. The latter apparently misread the reservation of Art. 14 no. 3, obviously due to oversight.

21. Suggested by Boele-Woelki, loc. cit. n. 19, 19 FJR (1997) p. 133.

22. See P.M.M. Mostermans, ‘Het toepasselijk recht op internationale alimentatie-overeen-komsten’ [The Law Applicable to International Maintenance Contracts], 19 FJR(1997)pp. 115–159.