ABSTRACT
Although the Brussels Convention adopts the concept of domicile as a central tenet, no definition of domicile appears within the Convention. Article 52 provides: ‘In order to determine whether a party is domiciled in the Contracting State, whose courts are seised of the matter, the court shall apply its internal Law.’ Thus, an English court will apply domestic law to determine whether X is domiciled in the UK. However, if the question for the English court is whether X is domiciled in France, then Art 52(2) requires the English court to apply the law of France. It needs to be noted at this point that domicile under the Brussels and Lugano Conventions is related to a State, not a country or law district. The object of the exercise is to link the defendant with the UK as a whole; special rules apply if further localisation is required.29
