From: Matthew Hoyle <MHoyle@oeclaw.co.uk>

Sent: Tuesday 11 February 2025 16:13

To: 'Jaamae Hafeez-Baig'; Gerard McMeel KC; William Swadling; Lionel Smith; obligations@uwo.ca

Subject: RE: Getting rid of italics

I entirely disagree with the thinking of that passage, from a practitioners perspective.

If someone simply sends me a summary of what a case says (and the point isn't trite or unimportant) then I will normally want to see and read the actual decision myself, because experience quickly teaches you that people are rather good at (perfectly innocently) either (a) selectively quoting judges out of context or (b) simply saying cases stand for a proposition that the judgment doesn t actually state in terms.

In written argument, both of those things are feeding your opponent material with which to undercut you and make the judge not trust your submission.

Of course you don't simply drop a quotation in and leave it to the reader to figure out. You quote and summarise what you say the principle is.

I know academics, and possibly other practitioners, take a different view. But there we are.

Matthew Hoyle

Barrister

One Essex Court

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From: Jaamae Hafeez-Baig <Jaamae.HB@brickcourt.co.uk>
Sent: 11 February 2025 16:02
To: Gerard McMeel KC <Gerard.mcmeel@quadrantchambers.com>; William Swadling <william.swadling@law.ox.ac.uk>; Lionel Smith <lionel.smith@law.ox.ac.uk>; obligations@uwo.ca
Subject: Re: Getting rid of italics

Hear, hear. Block quotations should be indented (and optionally in a slightly smaller font), but there is no need for italics or quotation marks. Both are redundant and italics makes the text harder to read.

Matthew Butterick s Typography for Lawyers is an excellent resource on points like these. His work, and in particular his guidance on block quotations below (taken from his website), deserve to be more widely known in the UK (and Australia).

Best wishes,

Jaamae

Mohammud Jaamae Hafeez-Baig Barrister	DDI: Tel: Mob:	+44 (0) 20 7520 9895 +44 (0) 20 7379 3550 +44 (0) 7307 902 376
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From: Gerard McMeel KC <Gerard.mcmeel@quadrantchambers.com>
Date: Tuesday 11 February 2025 at 15:51
To: William Swadling <william.swadling@law.ox.ac.uk>, Lionel Smith <lionel.smith@law.ox.ac.uk>, "obligations@uwo.ca" <obligations@uwo.ca>
Subject: EXT: Re: Getting rid of italics

Without wishing to add to a chorus of grumpy old men - are Bill and Lionel not missing the principal vice of italics in legal texts? Namely that case names should be in italics - and we do tend to look out for those highlights?

Gerard 

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From: William Swadling <william.swadling@law.ox.ac.uk>
Sent: 11 February 2025 15:41
To: Lionel Smith <lionel.smith@law.ox.ac.uk>; obligations@uwo.ca <obligations@uwo.ca>
Subject: RE: Getting rid of italics

External Email

I agree with Lionel.  The real culprits are the Australians, who in their academic literature seem to put quotes in italics and then either indent or use quotation marks or both.  The reader already knows from the presence of quotation marks or indentation that they are reading a quote.  They don t need it shoved down their throat.

Bill 

From: Lionel Smith <lionel.smith@law.ox.ac.uk>
Sent: 11 February 2025 15:06
To: obligations@uwo.ca
Subject: Getting rid of italics

I entirely agree with Matthew. I feel obliged, however, to register my discontent with the practice of setting quotations in italic text. Quotations should be set within inverted commas, either single or double, said the very pedantic Smith. He went on:

Of course, inverted commas are often called quotation marks ; and it goes without saying that longer quotations more text than will fit on a single line should be set in indented text, without inverted commas. Italics, however, while they are suitable for emphasis or for non-English words, should not be used for quotations.

LDS

From: Matthew Hoyle <MHoyle@oeclaw.co.uk>
Date: Tuesday 11 February 2025 at 12:02
To: ODG <obligations@uwo.ca>
Subject: Getting rid of equitable remedies

Dear all,

Those with an interest in equitable remedies may be interested by the English Court of Appeal s decision today in UniCredit v RusChemAlliance [2025] EWCA Civ 99.

Last year, the CA granted a final anti-suit last injunction restraining defendant from pursuing proceedings in Russia based on an English law governed (albeit French-seated) arbitration clause: [2024] EWCA Civ 64. This was upheld by the UKSC: [2024] UKSC 30. The Russian court then says nice try, but if you don t get that anti-suit discharged you ll forfeit 250m of your assets in Russia . Claimant decides to surrender and asks CA to discharge the anti-suit.

A question arises from court: do we have the power to do this?

The CA for some reason thinks this raises an issue of what is now called the finality principle : see [19]. So it asks The question, then, is whether there is power under CPR Part 3.1(7) to revoke or amend the CA s Order in this case at the behest of UniCredit, with the agreement of RCA. It seems to me that such power must exist, both on the authorities I have cited and because of the unusual nature of the grant of a final anti-suit injunction.

The Master of the Rolls ultimately reasons:

Secondly, this is private litigation between commercial parties. It would be very strange if a party that had obtained an injunction, even a final one, could never return to the court to ask that, in the changed circumstances that followed the grant of the injunction, it wanted it discharged. Take the example of the court granting a final injunction in favour of one landowner against another using adjoining land in a particular way. It would be surprising, in that situation, if the claimant landowner could not return to court to ask for the injunction to be discharged because, say, either planning permission had been granted permitting the use that had been injuncted, or the landowners had simply reached a commercial agreement varying their rights (see two first instance decisions suggesting this may be the case in different situations: Re Cabot Financial (UK) Ltd [2021] EWHC 789 (Ch), at [2]-[7], and Madison CF UK v. Various [2018] EWHC 2786 (Ch) at [29]-[51]).

The Court therefore discharges the anti-suit elements of the order: [44]-[55].

I agree with the MR s reasoning from principle, but is this point really that unclear? And is this not (a rare example of) a genuine inherent jurisdiction issue? I had understood the court of equity can always dissolve any final (perpetual) equitable remedy enforcing private rights at the behest of the party obtaining it (subject, I suppose to abuse of process or duress/fraud concerns see [29] of the MR s judgment). So for example in, the well-known decision in  Johnson v Agnew [1980] AC 367, 394 (Lord Wilberforce):

Fifthly, if the order for specific performance is not complied with by the purchaser, the vendor may either apply to the court for enforcement of the order, or may apply to the court to dissolve the order and ask the court to put an end to the contract. This proposition is as stated in Austins of East Ham Ltd. v. Macey [1941] Ch. 338 (and see Singh (Sudagar) v. Nazeer [1979] Ch. 474 , 480, per Megarry V.-C.) and is in my opinion undoubted law, both on principle and authority.

Lord Wilberforce does not say but of course, once the SP order is made, then we must consider finality . I cannot see how it would be different for an injunction specifically enforcing a private right (in this case, a contractual right that the defendant arbitrate a dispute), but I would be interested to know if anyone has a different view?

Is this not simply an aspect of the nature of equitable remedies. Because specific relief is prospective in effect, it is entirely different to a determination of the kind whether event X has happened in the past, or whether a past breach must be compensated by a fixed amount of money. Once these things is determined then there must be finality (and of course a claimant can always agree to cancel a judgment debt by contract). But the future is uncertain, and circumstances may change such that it is no longer sensible or just for the court to continue holding the defendant over a barrel, requiring they do or do not do something. I can t think the Chancery would have bound its hands with such inflexibility as by adopting a finality principle in this regard. Is the Court of Appeal simply being misled by the change in name from perpetual to final ?

Matthew Hoyle Barrister www.oeclaw.co.uk

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