Abstract

The expansion of cross-border commerce has made the question of when English courts may exercise jurisdiction over foreign defendants one of the most contested issues in private international law. This paper evaluates the English jurisdictional framework in three stages. First, it examines whether the current regime of jurisdictional gateways, as amended by the 2022 reforms to Practice Direction 6B, strikes an acceptable balance between certainty, fairness and access to justice, drawing on the divided reasoning in Brownlie II. Second, it assesses the Briggs-Dickinson proposal for a statutory two-list model, arguing that while the proposal improves clarity and procedural efficiency, it treats jurisdiction as a mechanism for allocating disputes rather than as a constitutional limit on judicial authority, thereby risking the substitution of rule-based certainty for discretionary evaluation. Third, it considers the tort gateway’s application to transnational environmental litigation through Vedanta Resources plc v Lungowe and Chandler v Cape plc, contending that the broad interpretation of “damage” endorsed in Brownlie is essential if claimants harmed by the overseas operations of English-domiciled corporations are to secure access to justice. The paper concludes that reform should clarify, rather than abolish, the existing gateways.

Introduction

The growing frequency of cross-border disputes, driven by the ever-expanding interconnectedness of people, has made questions of jurisdiction one of the most significant issues in modern private international law. As international commerce, travel and multinational corporate activity continue to expand, courts are required to determine the circumstances in which they may lawfully exercise authority over foreign defendants.

This paper examines the effectiveness of the English jurisdictional framework by considering three related issues. Firstly, it evaluates whether the current jurisdictional rules are fit for purpose in balancing certainty, fairness and access to justice. Secondly, it assesses whether the Briggs-Dickinson proposal for remodelling current practices offers a workable alternative to the existing gateway regime. Finally, it considers the contemporary application of the tort gateway through environmental litigation, exploring whether the interpretation of “damage” can address the realities of modern transnational disputes. Collectively, these issues demonstrate the continuing challenge of designing a just interjurisdictional framework that is both principled in theory and effective in practice.

Part 1: Is the Current Jurisdictional Framework Fit for Purpose?

Background 

In the modern era, individuals, places and governments are more connected than ever before. As cross-border interactions have become more common, determining which country’s courts have jurisdiction has become an increasingly significant legal issue. The term “jurisdiction” refers to the power and authority of a court, government or law enforcement agency to apply and enforce the law against an individual or body. Jurisdiction determines who has the right to exercise legal power over people or bodies in a wide variety of circumstances; it is the foundation for cross-border disputes, as it defines the limits of a court’s authority.

Jurisdiction is organised into three interconnected categories. Territorial jurisdiction is based on geographic boundaries such as national borders and state sovereignty; subject matter jurisdiction can vary depending on the legal issue being addressed; and personal jurisdiction determines whether the courts have authority over the bodies involved. In disputes involving multiple countries, jurisdiction law relies on all three categories mentioned earlier: courts must assess which category the dispute falls under and whether it has sufficient relevance to England for the courts to exercise their authority.

Moreover, according to the Law Society’s International Data Insights Report, as cited by Astraea Group Limited and Philippe Kuhn (2025), “a record 64% of litigants in cases between April 2023 and March 2024 came from jurisdictions outside the UK, representing a total of 84 nationalities”. The data clearly reinforces England’s leading role in dealing with international disputes. This highlights the importance of England’s jurisdictional rules remaining clear, efficient and consistent. 

When a case is filed against a foreign defendant, there is a four-step process for determining whether the English courts are the proper forum and whether the case is suitable to be heard. The first step, as set out in CPR 6.36 and 6.37, is that the claimant must seek permission from the courts to serve a defendant outside the English and Welsh jurisdiction. The second step is for the case to pass at least one of the Gateways.

A gateway is essentially a list of factors or set of circumstances within the case that enable England or Wales to have a substantial connection to the case. The concept of “substantial connection” prevents claimants from bringing cases to England with only a weak link to the jurisdiction. An example of a gateway is the tort gateway, which states: “A claim is made in tort where (a) damage was sustained, or will be sustained, within the jurisdiction; or (b) damage which has been or will be sustained results from an act committed, or likely to be committed, within the jurisdiction.”

The third step is the “Proper Place” Limb, which is similar to the Gateways, except that its sole purpose is to consider and conclude whether England or Wales is the most appropriate and fair place to conduct the case. Even if a court has found that England or Wales could be a proper place, forum non conveniens allows a court to dismiss a case because a better place to litigate exists. The fourth and final step is that the claimant must prove that there is a reasonable prospect of success, and the claim must show a serious issue to be tried on the merits. The jurisdictional gateways act as a threshold requirement, ensuring that there is sufficient connection between the claimant and the jurisdiction before the English courts can exercise jurisdiction over a foreign defendant.

Impact

The current effectiveness of jurisdiction laws can be measured by examining how well they fulfilled their obligations before the 2022 jurisdiction law reforms and how much the 2022 reforms improved the wide variety of interpretation, affecting clarity, fairness and the predictability of trials. Before the 2022 reforms, several key terms in these gateways were drafted extremely loosely, leading to wide margins of judicial interpretation. The most problematic term in the judicial system was “damage sustained within the jurisdiction”.

Courts interpreted this phrase in a wide range of ways. Many judges adopted a narrower view of damage, “as a direct result of the defendant’s wrongful act and does not include indirect or consequential losses”, but a good many others interpreted it as a broader term, which “refers to any significant harm of any kind, whether physical, psychological or financial, which results either directly or indirectly from a tortious act committed by the defendant”. This division in interpretations created significant instability.

It made gateway satisfaction incredibly easy. In 2022, reforms were passed to address the multitude of issues the gateways had created, clarifying the categories of damage that create jurisdiction. The reforms of 2022 divided the gateways into three distinct limbs and emphasised the distinction between direct damage and indirect harm, including financial damage outside the direct damage region.

The reforms aimed to limit judges’ interpretive discretion in cases and thereby maintain consistent judicial outcomes. However, while the reforms improved the definitions of terms, such as the difference between damage and harm, they also introduced many new complexities, including more rigorous testing of relevance to England, which makes the process fairer for foreign defendants but increases legal fees and makes the process more complex. 

The idea behind the 2022 reforms was to simplify judicial analysis, which, in turn, would lead to more consistent rulings; however, some structures became more technical, creating legal uncertainty. At the same time, oversimplified gateways have led to claimants in England, whose injuries genuinely affected them, no longer being eligible under the revised categories. The 2022 reforms have, in many ways, produced more predictable results, but in others, have raised new questions of interpretation. Overall, the reforms improved consistency and reduced the most problematic ambiguities, but they have created new areas of legal dispute.

Tension

Jurisdictional laws are influenced by globalisation. However, English jurisdictional laws reflect legal principles common in Western legal systems and are not tied to the client or country, given England’s new emphasis on the necessity of jurisdictional law.

This raises an important question: what really justifies one country’s authority to impose its laws on parties in another country, especially when there is only a weak connection between them? There’s a fair point for the current approach, since it gives courts room to navigate genuinely complex international disputes, but that same flexibility can undermine consistency, leaving justice less predictable than it should be. However, recent rulings favouring foreign clients suggest that English jurisdictional law is gradually moving towards fairer, more balanced outcomes.

This tension is illustrated by FS Cairo (Nile Plaza) LLC v Brownlie [2021] UKSC 45. By a 4:1 majority, the Supreme Court held that “damage” within the tort gateway “refers to actionable harm, whether direct or indirect” (Lord Lloyd-Jones JSC, para. 81), thus allowing Lady Brownlie’s tort claims to proceed despite the accident occurring in Egypt. Lord Leggatt JSC dissented, warning that this interpretation turned the gateway into “an open territory with no fence” (para. 171), enabling a claimant to found jurisdiction simply by returning home and continuing to suffer “pain or disability which continues after the claimant returns home” (para. 171). He argued instead that jurisdiction should require “some substantial and not merely casual or adventitious link” to England (para. 192).

On the separate issue of foreign law, the Court was unanimous that, unless evidence demonstrated otherwise, a court may presume that foreign law is materially similar to English law. As Lord Leggatt explained, the presumption applies “unless… evidence… shows that it was in fact materially different” (para. 125). Accordingly, the appeal was dismissed by a 4:1 majority on the tort gateway issue and unanimously on the foreign law issue. It’s important to realise that English law is continually adapting to new cases. As the Brownlie case judgment demonstrates, broadly worded jurisdiction rules can lead to confusion and inconsistent interpretations, highlighting the need to clarify the jurisdiction framework.

Part 2: The Effectiveness of the Briggs-Dickinson Proposal

Proposal

Never before has the question of whether a court has the right to hear cross-border disputes been so complex and costly in international litigation. In many contemporary legal systems, arguing technical questions before the court, even before the merits of the case are considered, causes parties to spend years and millions of dollars. To tackle this problem, a statutory two-list framework has been proposed. List A and List B were designed to replace difficult procedural rules with simpler, clearer grounds for jurisdiction. 

List A represents automatic gateways to jurisdiction that cover transparent scenarios, such as explicit choice-of-court agreements, statutory authorisations or the defendant’s primary residence. By contrast, List B handles broader, more nuanced claims, such as torts outside the UK or property disputes. This two-tier system aims to reduce friction in litigation while ensuring fairness for overseas defendants. It recognises that while List B requires judicial evaluation, the two-list model as a whole is a highly practical and effective reform. List A provides absolute certainty for straightforward cases, while List B creates a structured, predictable filter for complex cases. The proposed model successfully rationalises jurisdictional determinations without surrendering judicial equality.

Advantages

The Briggs-Dickinson proposal, which uses List A and List B, offers a more practical and organised way of deciding when English courts should take jurisdiction over a foreign defendant. It preserves the important distinction between having jurisdiction at all and deciding whether the court should exercise it.

One major advantage is that the proposal brings clarity by focusing on whether there is a “real and substantial connection” between the claim and England. List A identifies types of cases that always satisfy this connection, so if a claim fits one of these, the court clearly has jurisdiction. This prevents courts from stretching old or unclear rules, which happens under the current system. List B then lists situations where jurisdiction might be possible, but only if the claimant can show additional evidence of a strong link to England. Together, the two lists create a framework that is both clear and flexible.

Another advantage is that the proposal places the forum conveniens test back in its proper place. Instead of letting the “proper place” question dominate the entire procedure, the proposal uses it only after jurisdiction is established. By putting the real connection test inside the gateways themselves, the system avoids the mistake of treating the existence of jurisdiction and the exercise of jurisdiction as the same thing. This responds directly to the problems raised in cases like Brownlie.

The proposal is also fairer to foreign defendants. The structured gateways act as an early filter, ensuring that only claims with a genuine basis can proceed. This is supported by procedural steps such as requiring a statement of truth and, under Clause 11, requiring the claimant to apply to the court if the defendant does not respond. These measures protect foreign defendants from weak, abusive or unfair claims while still allowing legitimate cases to move forward.

Additionally, the proposal improves efficiency. The current rules often create long and expensive disputes about how to interpret the gateways. With clearer categories and stronger evidence requirements from the start, the new framework reduces wasted time and resources. For example, a tort claim for an injury that happened in England would automatically fall under List A, preventing long arguments about whether the gateway fits and squandered money on legal fees.

Finally, the proposal strikes a balance between strict rules and total judicial discretion. Although Professor Briggs once argued for removing gateways entirely, this proposal recognises that some rules are needed to protect fairness and legal certainty. At the same time, it avoids being too rigid by allowing flexibility through List B and the real-connection test. This makes the system clearer, fairer and more consistent.

Negatives

Although the Briggs-Dickinson proposal is an ambitious attempt to simplify the increasingly fragmented jurisdictional gateway regime, we believe it ultimately fails to provide a wholly workable solution. While the proposal undoubtedly improves the accessibility of English private international law by consolidating the existing gateways into Lists A and B, it does so by treating jurisdiction primarily as a procedural mechanism for allocating disputes rather than as a constitutional limitation on the exercise of judicial authority. 

In doing so, it addresses the complexity of the current framework but overlooks the more fundamental question of why English courts should possess jurisdiction over foreign defendants. The proposal assumes that procedural complexity is the principal weakness of the current regime. However, Brownlie II suggests that the more fundamental issue is constitutional rather than procedural: on what legitimate basis should English courts exercise authority over a defendant whose conduct has little or no meaningful territorial connection to England?

The proposal’s principal weakness lies not in its drafting, but in its underlying conception of jurisdiction. Briggs has long argued that the existing gateways have become overly technical, fragmented and incapable of performing any meaningful filtering function, advocating instead for a simplified framework with greater reliance on forum conveniens. While this streamlines the procedural structure, Lord Leggatt’s dissent in FS Cairo (Nile Plaza) LLC v Brownlie demonstrates why simplification alone cannot justify reform.

In his view, the jurisdictional gateways perform a constitutional function: they establish the legal basis on which English courts may lawfully exercise coercive authority over foreign defendants before any discretionary assessment of convenience is made. Their purpose is therefore fundamentally distinct from that of forum conveniens. As Lord Leggatt observed, allowing the doctrine of forum conveniens to compensate for an overly expansive gateway “involves a category error”, because the existence of jurisdiction and the exercise of jurisdiction address two conceptually distinct legal questions.

Brownlie II provides a compelling illustration of this distinction. The alleged negligence occurred entirely in Egypt, the defendant was an Egyptian company and Egyptian law governed the substantive claim. Nevertheless, the majority concluded that the continuing physical and financial consequences in England constituted “damage” sustained within the jurisdiction. Lord Leggatt rejected this interpretation, warning that such an approach rendered the tort gateway effectively “portable”, allowing jurisdiction to depend largely on the claimant’s subsequent residence rather than on any substantial connection between the defendant’s conduct and England. This criticism exposes a broader weakness in the Briggs-Dickinson proposal.

Had Lists A and B been applied, the result would likely have been the same, not because the tort had a stronger territorial connection with England, but because broader jurisdictional categories would have allowed the court to reach the same conclusion through judicial discretion rather than through clearly defined legal rules. In effect, the proposal risks reproducing the very outcome that Lord Leggatt regarded as constitutionally objectionable, albeit through a different procedural mechanism. Rather than resolving the concerns exposed in Brownlie II, it risks diluting the principled limits on the exercise of English jurisdiction by replacing structured legal thresholds with broader discretionary standards.

Moreover, the proposal replaces technical complexity with discretionary uncertainty. Dickinson argues that jurisdictional rules should constrain judicial discretion and promote legal certainty, rather than encourage costly satellite litigation over forum. Similarly, the Supreme Court of Canada in Club Resorts Ltd v Van Breda emphasised that private international law requires stable jurisdictional principles capable of ensuring predictability rather than ad hoc assessments of individual fairness. Although Briggs correctly identifies the deficiencies of the current gateway regime, his proposal ultimately substitutes rule-based certainty with broader judicial evaluation. A more principled reform would therefore simplify and clarify the existing gateways while preserving their constitutional function of defining the legitimate limits of English judicial authority.

Analysis

Ultimately, the interpretation of “damage” in Brownlie II reflects a broader challenge in private international law: balancing access to justice with jurisdictional certainty. A wider interpretation enables English courts to respond to the realities of modern transnational disputes, particularly those involving multinational corporations and environmental harm. At the same time, Lord Leggatt’s concerns about forum shopping, and the expansion of English jurisdiction remain valid. Rather than proving one approach is unquestionably correct, Brownlie II shows that the law must continue to balance flexibility with clear jurisdictional limits as cross-border litigation becomes increasingly common.

Part 3: The Jurisdictional Gateways and Environmental Claims

Damage

The UK Supreme Court’s interpretation of “damage” in Brownlie I (although a case about the proper defendant and the comments on jurisdiction being obiter) and II favours a broad, discretionary approach to jurisdictional gateways, rather than a narrow, technical reading. It was arguably this very approach that successfully protected Lady Brownlie’s personal and financial injuries by prioritising the spirit and substance of the case rather than adhering to constructionist legal texts. Using the example of FS Cairo LLC v Brownlie, we must continue to treat the law as a living structure: constantly evolving to adapt to the changing global tides that lead to an ever “shrinking world” (Briggs, 2013).

This observation, duly noted by Professor Briggs, lies in the increasing interconnectivity between countries and their growing willingness to do business with each other. With this, the courts must adapt their use of gateways to provide a fair and natural solution for individuals who, like Lady Brownlie, may become entangled in large businesses that span a big part of our small world. The widespread and growing pursuit of international business has inevitably led to a debate over the meaning of “damage” in overseas operations. As a result, the question arises of whether environmental harm is included in the Court’s interpretation of “damage” and whether the jurisdictional tort gateway can successfully protect individuals affected.

Example Cases

It is a natural inclination for transnational corporations to create smaller subsidiaries in developing countries; Vedanta Resources formed KCM to control mining operations in Zambia. The case arises from alleged toxic emissions from the copper mine affecting a very poor community of farmers. The claim is that the community’s watercourses, which the farmers use as their only source of drinking water, have become polluted as a result of the company’s operations, damaging their health, ruining their crops and disrupting their fishing industry. 

The issue reached the UK Supreme Court as a debate over jurisdiction: Mr Lungowe and approximately 1,820 other Zambian farmers initially sued the parent company Vedanta Resources, believing they were owed a duty of care for their personal health, safety and the protection of their properties. The English High Court of Justice held that it was triable whether parent companies domiciled in England were liable for claims against their overseas subsidiaries. In this case, it was asserted that Vedanta Resources was liable for KCM’s negligence in failing to regulate mining emissions, which subsequently caused indirect damage to the surrounding residents. In disagreement with the decision, Vedanta Resources escalated the issue to the UK Supreme Court, where the dispute over where environmental regulations can be enforced on parent companies continued.

The UK Supreme Court held that the claims against Vedanta Resources should be heard in England, given that England is the company’s country of origin (Dickinson, 2023). In other words, the appeal upheld England as the proper forum for cases involving overseas violations of “environmental” torts, such as those of Mr Lungowe and Zambian farmers. It is, however, important to note that Vedanta was not decided on the basis of jurisdictional gateways. 

Although the proper place test, which found Zambia was the proper place, proved faithful to the claims of these foreign defendants, it’s merely a discretionary tool to determine whether it’s in the nature and tradition of the UK Supreme Court to hear the case. Through an analysis of jurisdictional gateways, we can discern the legal mentality behind the Court’s decision: cases should be assessed by “spirit” or “substance” rather than by strict, often unyielding adherence to the verbatim legal text. Such is the opinion of Lord Briggs, who argues that when the courts refer to jurisdictional gateways to determine whether they have authority over a particular case, they must do so with natural and ordinary logic.

In other words, when assessing whether a claim can be heard in England, we should interpret it as we would any issue in our daily lives. Environmental damage is damage caused by pollutants such as heavy metals or toxic chemicals that contaminate air, water or land, affecting multiple people and properties (Rolf, 2020). When assessing the claims of Mr Lungowe and other claimants, the court found that their losses, including loss of health, crops and income, fell within the definition of environmental damage, a form of legitimate, sustained damage under the tort gateway. Again, it is important to note that while this is not the basis on which the case was decided, it is an accurate ex post rationalisation. 

As seen in Vedanta Resources, a company may release a dangerous substance into the environment, but people exposed to it may not become ill until years later. Pollution can also damage water or land and eventually affect people’s health, property, jobs or income. This raises an important question when applying the tort gateway, as courts must determine what counts as “damage” and where that damage occurred. Chandler v Cape plc is useful in this context because it addresses a company’s responsibility for harm caused by exposure to a dangerous substance.

Although Chandler was not itself a tort gateway case, it can also be connected to the wider interpretation of “damage” seen in FS Cairo (Nile Plaza) LLC v Brownlie. In Chandler v Cape plc, David Chandler worked for Cape Building Products Ltd., a subsidiary of the larger parent company Cape plc, between 1959 and 1962. While there, he was exposed to asbestos dust. However, the full effects of this exposure did not become clear immediately. Years later, Chandler developed asbestosis, a serious lung disease caused by asbestos exposure. By the time Chandler became ill, the subsidiary he worked for no longer existed. Chandler therefore brought a negligence claim against Cape plc, arguing that the parent company owed him a duty of care because of its knowledge of the dangers of asbestos and the working conditions within its subsidiary.

The Court of Appeal held that Cape plc owed Chandler a duty of care. This does not mean that every parent company automatically becomes responsible for everything its subsidiary does wrong. Instead, the Court examined Cape’s own actions, knowledge and involvement. Cape had greater knowledge of the health risks associated with asbestos and was aware of the conditions to which workers such as Chandler were being exposed.

The decision was important because it showed that the legal separation between a parent company and its subsidiary does not necessarily end the question of responsibility. Courts can instead look at the actual relationship between the companies and whether the parent company’s own actions created a duty of care. This idea is especially important when considering environmental damage caused by international corporations. Large companies often conduct activities such as mining, oil production, manufacturing and chemical production through smaller subsidiaries. The subsidiary may operate a mine or factory in another country. However, the parent company may still know about the environmental risks or be involved in setting policies the subsidiary follows. Chandler therefore gives us a way to think about whether a larger corporation can be responsible for environmental harm even when it was not the company directly releasing a pollutant.

The harm suffered by Chandler also relates to the meaning of “damage” discussed in Brownlie II. Brownlie II held that “damage” could include actionable harm, whether direct or indirect, and rejected the idea that a claimant could not suffer damage in more than one place. This interpretation is particularly useful when applied to environmental damage.

Imagine, for example, that toxic chemicals from a factory enter a river. The initial damage may be the contamination of the water itself. However, that is not where the damage ends. People may become ill from drinking the water, farmers may lose crops, fishermen may lose their income and people living nearby may no longer be able to use the river safely. These consequences may unfold over months or years.

If “damage” were interpreted only as the first physical effect of the pollution, it could overlook many of the actual consequences experienced by those affected. Chandler provides a good example of why this matters. Chandler’s exposure to asbestos occurred decades before the full consequences became clear. This is similar to many forms of environmental pollution, as the effects of dangerous substances may take a long time to develop. A person exposed to contaminated water, polluted air, asbestos or toxic chemicals may not immediately know that they have been harmed. This makes the broader interpretation of damage in Brownlie especially relevant to contemporary environmental issues.

There is also an important distinction between intentional environmental damage and negligence. A company need not intend to pollute the environment for a negligence claim to arise. Instead, the key question is whether the company knew, or reasonably should have known, that its activities created a risk and whether it took reasonable precautions. This is where Chandler is particularly useful. There was no requirement to show that Cape intentionally caused Chandler’s asbestosis. Instead, Cape’s knowledge of asbestos and its relationship with the subsidiary helped establish its duty of care. The same reasoning could apply to environmental harm.

If a parent company knows that an activity such as mining or chemical production creates serious environmental risks, its involvement in controlling or supervising those risks could be relevant to whether it owes a duty of care. This does not mean that parent companies are automatically responsible for everything their subsidiaries do. Chandler shows that the court must look at the particular facts, including what the parent company knew and how involved it was.

Analysis

Therefore, the court’s holdings in Brownlie I and II, Vedanta and Chandler collectively demonstrate that the Supreme Court adopted a broad interpretation of “damage sustained within the jurisdiction” under the tort jurisdictional gateway, allowing a more flexible and principled approach to foreign claims, specifically environmental tort cases, where claimants seek compensation for tangible harm caused by transnational corporations and their subsidiaries. 

By moving beyond narrow interpretations and assessing the “spirit” of the case, the Supreme Court recognises that environmental harm encompasses not only personal injury but also property damage and economic loss, all of which constitute “damage”. At a time when international corporations operate through complex subsidiary structures for monetary gain, it is important to acknowledge that adhering to strict legal interpretations risks denying rightful remedies to those who suffer environmental damage: innocent civilians with no involvement whatsoever. Therefore, this refutes Lord Leggatt’s dissenting argument that damage requires direct harm within the jurisdiction.

The Supreme Court’s jurisprudence reflects its understanding that claimants in environmental torts deserve equal access to justice, as in other forms of negligence. This approach seeks to prevent British corporations from evading responsibility merely because they operated overseas through their subsidiaries. Overall, the interpretation of “damage” stemming from the Brownlie case laid the foundations for English courts to hear environmental tort claims, which are likely to become more prevalent in the future due to the intensification of climate change and its impacts, as well as litigation against companies for failing to implement adequate environmental safeguards and precautions.

Conclusion

To conclude, English jurisdictional law has continued to evolve in response to challenges highlighted by the Brownlie cases and the 2022 reforms, which refined the broad interpretation of “damage”; however, further refinement is necessary. To elaborate, the Briggs-Dickinson proposal supports the total abolition of existing gateways and the consolidation of the List A and List B processes, allowing greater flexibility in determining adjudicatory jurisdiction. While the two-list model enhances clarity and procedural efficiency, its success ultimately depends on whether it can preserve the principled limits that justify the exercise of English jurisdiction over foreign defendants. 

Despite the pros and cons of the proposal, it is clear that reform is needed. This debate over the current effectiveness of jurisdictional gateways also applies to contemporary legal issues arising from international business. As corporations increasingly interact across countries, the risk of cross-border damage, particularly environmental damage, also arises. Consequently, a state’s natural resources, air quality, residents’ health and biodiversity are all, in some way, subject to damage from international corporate activity. To address such issues, the interpretation of the tort gateway, specifically the “damage” limbs, needs to be broadened to incorporate environmental harm that has frequently arisen because of the increasing interconnectedness of the world.

Adrian Briggs, Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments (7th edn, Informa Law from Routledge, 2021).

Adrian Briggs & Andrew Dickinson, A New Framework for Jurisdiction in Civil and Commercial Matters (Civil Justice Council, 2018).

Andrew Dickinson, ‘Service Out of the Jurisdiction – Raising Spirits?’ (2023) 82(1) Cambridge Law Journal, pp. 25–29.

Carol A Rolf, ‘Environmental Torts’ (EBSCO Research Starters, 2020) <https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/environmental-sciences/environmental-torts>

Legal 500, English Jurisdiction Challenges: Some Recent Guidance (2019) <https://www.legal500.com/developments/thought-leadership/english-jurisdiction-challenges-some-recent-guidance>

Katherine Todd et al., ‘Jurisdictional Issues in Cross-Border Litigation’ (2020) 1(1) Journal of International Commercial Law and Technology, pp. 46–49.

Ministry of Justice, ‘The Civil Procedure (Amendment No. 2) Rules 2022 – Explanatory Memorandum’ (Legislation.gov.uk, 13 July 2022). <https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2022/783/memorandum>

Ministry of Justice, ‘Practice Direction 6B – Service Out of the Jurisdiction’ (Civil Procedure Rules, updated 1 October 2022). <https://www.justice.gov.uk/courts/procedure-rules/civil/rules/part06/pd_part06b>

Ministry of Justice, ‘The Civil Procedure (Amendment No. 2) Rules 2022’ (Legislation.gov.uk, 13 July 2022). <https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2022/783/contents/made>

Ministry of Justice, ‘The Civil Procedure (Amendment No. 2) Rules 2022 – Explanatory Memorandum’ (Legislation.gov.uk, 13 July 2022).

Ministry of Justice, ‘Practice Direction 6B – Service Out of the Jurisdiction’ (Civil Procedure Rules, updated 1 October 2022).

Cases:

Brownlie v Four Seasons Holdings Inc [2017] UKSC 80, [2018] 1 WLR 192 (‘Brownlie I’).

Chandler v Cape plc [2012] EWCA Civ 525, [2012] 1 WLR 3111.

Club Resorts Ltd v Van Breda [2012] SCC 17.

FS Cairo (Nile Plaza) LLC v Brownlie [2021] UKSC 45, [2021] 3 WLR 1011.

FS Cairo (Nile Plaza) LLC v Brownlie [2021] UKSC 45, [2022] AC 995 (‘Brownlie II’).

Okpabi v Royal Dutch Shell plc [2021] UKSC 3, [2021] 1 WLR 1294.

Vedanta Resources plc v Lungowe [2019] UKSC 20, [2020] AC 1045.