The Eleventh Annual General Meeting of the Australian Branch of the Institute will be held on Monday 2 May 2005 at 5:30pm at Clayton Utz, Level 34, 1 O'Connell Street, Sydney, NSW; Blake Dawson Waldron, Level 39, 101 Collins Street, Melbourne, VIC; and Level 19, 221 St George's Terrace, Perth, WA. Reports from the Chairman and the Treasurer will be received and the election of Committee Members will take place.

Written notice and forms have been mailed out. If you have not received them, or you believe the mailing address we have for you is out of date, please email your correct details to neridacook@acdcltd.com.au.

In November last year Doug Jones AM RFD was appointed as a Trustee of the Institute. Due to this appointment he resigns as chairman of the Australian Branch and is replaced by Michael Shand QC.

The Institute celebrated its 90th Birthday with a new charter, signed by HM the Queen in late February. This enabled the Institute to hold the inaugural meeting of its Board of Trustees in Cyprus on the 1st March. The newly formed Board is part of the Institutes global push, with members from all five continents and seven different regions being elected, including former Australian Branch chairman Doug Jones AM RFD.

The meeting was followed by the Institutes first World Congress, attended by the 35 trustees and branch chairman from 17 countries, including the new United Arab Emirates Branch. The Australian Branch was represented by newly appointed chairman Michael Shand QC. Congress session topics included Education and Training for the Future, The Institutes Future as an Appointing Body and A Broader Discussion on Sustaining Membership Growth Around the World.

The Congress also included the election of Presidents for 2005-2007. There were 12 candiates from around the world, with Dr Eugen Salpius from Austria (2005), Colin Wall from Hong Kong (2006) and Hew Dundas from London (2007) winning the position.

The Hon N A Brown QC has kindly sent us a case note he has been working on. The note is on the recent appeal decision in Through Transport Mutual Insurance Association (Eurasia) Limited v New India Assurance Association Company Limited (2004) EWCA Civ 1598 (UK Court of Appeal 2 December 2004). The case deals with how the verdict has provided some clarity on the courts view of a situation where there are arbitration and Scott vs Avery clauses in a contract, but one party wants the parties held to arbitration, while the other party has started and wants to bring or continue with court proceedings in a foreign country. For the full case note click here.

Robert Hunter QC has kindly allowed us to share his recent paper on award writing by arbitrators, which he presented to the NSW Bar Association. To read the paper click here

There is a Diploma Course in International Commercial Arbitration taking place in Hong Kong on the 2nd-10th November 2005. For more information click here.

There is also a seminar on "Managing Sports Disputes" taking place in London on the 20th-21st June 2005. For more information click here.