COMMERCIAL ARBITRATION AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY DISPUTES

As late as the 1960s there was an old gentleman in once smart, but now shabby, clothes who paraded outside the Royal Courts of Justice in the Strand, carrying a placard which read ‘ARBITRATE DON’T LITIGATE’. He was a famous character who had been around since the 1930s and he endeared himself to the judges who referred to him in several judgments. It is fair to say, however, that the old gentleman was usually referred to in order to make the point that, in the case before the court, his advice had been misleading because the arbitration had proved far more difficult and costly than proceeding by way of litigation in the courts.