Polish Supreme Court order dated 7 June 2019 Case No. I CSK 76/19
1. [P]roceedings initiated by a petition to set aside an arbitration award do not lead to a repeated substantive consideration of the dispute, but their purpose is only to verify the applicant’s pleadings presented in the petition as to existence of grounds referred to in Art. 1206 § 1 of the Polish Civil Procedure Code, and to assess if any of the conditions referred to in Art. Art. 1206 § 2 of the Polish Civil Procedure Code exist, regardless of whether the applicant relied thereon (…).
2. Application by an arbitral tribunal of the substantive law applicable in the case is subject to control by a common court, only inasmuch as it is required to assess the award in terms of compliance with the public policy clause specified in Art. 1206 § 2 (2) of the Polish Civil Procedure Code (…).
3. An arbitration award may be set aside pursuant to the public policy clause, only if violation of substantive law by an arbitral tribunal has consequences which are impossible to be consistent with the fundamental principles of Polish legal order, i.e. which are clearly and grossly contrary to these principles (…). An ad casum assessment whether an award violates the fundamental principles of legal order shall be made with caution, with a preference for restrictive interpretation of its wording (…).
4. Abstractedly speaking, there are no doubts that an assessment of an arbitral tribunal under Art. 1206 § 1 and 2 of the Polish Civil Procedure Code requires – to a smaller or larger extent – determination of the course of broadly understood arbitration proceedings (procedural actions of the parties, procedural decisions of the arbitration tribunal, examination of evidence, factual findings and interpretation, as well as application by the arbitral tribunal of relevant provisions of substantive law (…)), which also applies to the appellate court.
Publication date: 07-06-2019 | Case no.: I CSK 76/19
Key issues: petition to set aside arbitration awardid: 20525