By: Thabiso Faith Mutumhe
The Arbitration Act 2025 (the “2025 Act”), which came into force on August 1, 2025, is the first major overhaul of the United Kingdom’s (UK) arbitration framework since the Arbitration Act 1996, nearly 30 years ago.[1] Rather than rewriting the 1996 Act, the 2025 Act represents a targeted modernization of the original legislation, reflecting the common “evolution not revolution” narrative across commentary.[2]
The 2025 Act became law on February 24, 2025, and will apply prospectively to arbitrations commenced after the effective date set by secondary legislation.[3] The 2025 Act provides a new statutory rule where the law of the seat applies by default unless the parties expressly choose another law.[4] This rule reverses the decision in Enka Insaat Ve Sanayi A.S. v. OOO Ins. Co. Chubb,[5] thereby eliminating uncertainty and curbing situations where a London-seated arbitration clause is governed by foreign law with less supportive doctrines.[6] By aligning with institutional practices, such as the LCIA Rules, the 2025 Act promotes predictability and ensures that parties choosing London as a seat can rely on an arbitration-friendly legal regime for questions of scope and validity.[7] Additionally, the statutory default preserves party autonomy and avoids unintended interactions between the arbitral seat (the legal home of the arbitration and its procedural rules) and the governing law by allowing an express choice of a different governing law for the arbitration agreement.[8] As a result, sophisticated users must now be more deliberate when drafting.[9]
Reforms to jurisdictional challenges further reflect a policy preference for efficiency and finality over expansive judicial second-guessing of arbitration tribunals.[10] First, the clarification that parties cannot seek a court determination under Section 32 where the tribunal has already ruled on jurisdiction forces parties to choose between an early court ruling or a tribunal decision.[11] Second, Section 67 restricts parties from raising new grounds or evidence and generally precludes a rehearing.[12] This modification shifts away from a de novo rehearing model toward a review based on the arbitral record, therefore, reducing tactical re-litigation and cost, while subtly rebalancing in favor of upholding tribunals’ jurisdictional determinations.[13] Courts and procedural rule-makers will ultimately determine how strictly to apply these new limits, and their interpretation of the “interests of justice” exception—a flexible, fairness-based standard that permits departures from the usual rules to avoid unjust outcomes—will dictate whether Section 67 challenges remain viable.[14]
The Act expressly recognizes a summary disposal power, allowing tribunals to dismiss claims, defenses, or issues that have “no real prospect of success,” a standard that mirrors the summary-judgment test in the English Civil Procedure Rules (“CPR”).[15] Although parties may opt out, the combination of a statutory summary-disposal power and the CPR-derived “no real prospect of success” threshold makes the English approach more assertive than the “manifestly without merit” standard commonly used in many international arbitration rules.[16] Commentators note that this divergence from the emerging international norm may require tribunals and counsel in London-seated cases to navigate tensions between local litigation concepts and transnational expectations of arbitral due process.[17]
The 2025 Act codifies and strengthens duties and protections in a way that reflects the increased professionalization of arbitrators since the 1990s.[18] A statutory duty of disclosure now requires arbitrators to reveal circumstances that might give rise to justifiable doubts about impartiality, building on Halliburton Co. v. Chubb Bermuda Ins. Ltd [19] and aligning practice with leading institutional rules.[20] At the same time, enhanced immunity shields arbitrators from liability when they resign and from adverse costs: thus, reducing the chilling effect of tactical challenges on independent decision-making.[21]
The 2025 Act also modernizes the position of emergency arbitrators by granting an enforceable peremptory order, clarifying that court support and interim relief may extend to third parties, thereby addressing long-recognized gaps in the 1996 Act.[22] From a policy perspective, commentators broadly agree that these reforms consolidate London’s strengths—strong court support, efficient procedures, and provide a clear statutory framework—rather than revolutionizing the model.[23] Yet some see the incrementalism as a missed opportunity: the 2025 Act says nothing about artificial intelligence (AI) in arbitration, tribunal secretaries, or the interaction between sanctions and arbitral processes, all of which are becoming pressing issues in cross-border disputes.[24]
The result is a statute that fine-tunes an already successful regime but may require further amendment sooner than the thirty-year gap between the 1996 Act and 2025 Act, particularly as technological and geopolitical developments accelerate.[25] Overall, the 2025 Act should enhance certainty, efficiency, and user confidence in English-seated arbitrations, but its cautious scope ensures that debates over London’s long-term competitive edge in the global arbitration market are far from over—welcome to the new arbitration era, and mind the (legal) gap.[26]
[1] See Arbitration Act 2025, c. 4. (UK), https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2025/4 [https://perma.cc/D2FU-R6UN]; June Ong, The New Arbitration Act 2025: Necessary Modernization or Missed Opportunity?, Norton Rose Fulbright (July 2025), https://www.nortonrosefulbright.com/en/knowledge/publications/35bfdea7/the-new-arbitration-act-2025 [https://perma.cc/8KXC-RNJD].
[2] See Raid Abu-Manneh et al., Arbitration Act 2025 | Part 1: Five Most Impactful Changes for Businesses, Mayer Brown (Feb. 24, 2025), https://www.mayerbrown.com/en/insights/publications/2025/02/arbitration-act-2025-part-1-five-most-impactful-changes-for-businesses [https://perma.cc/7CL2-PJWN]; Charlie Caher et al., Evolution Not Revolution: Key Practical Implications of the New Arbitration Act 2025, Wilmer Hale (Mar. 4, 2025), https://www.wilmerhale.com/en/insights/client-alerts/20250304-evolution-not-revolution-key-practical-implications-of-the-new-arbitration-act-2025 [https://perma.cc/3W39-28D3].
[3] See Mark Beeley et al., English Arbitration Act 2025 – Bill Becomes Law, Orrick (Mar. 4, 2025), https://www.orrick.com/en/Insights/2025/03/English-Arbitration-Act-2025-Bill-Becomes-Law [https://perma.cc/6E2B-2ZZJ]; Ong, supra note 1 (explaining that the reform modernizes the legal infrastructure for arbitrations seated in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland); Fred Kuchlin, Arbitration Act 2025: Welcome Progress or Missed Opportunity?, Reynolds Porter Chamberlain LLP (Nov. 13, 2025), https://www.rpclegal.com/thinking/international-arbitration/arbitration-act-2025-welcome-progress-or-missed-opportunity/ [https://perma.cc/262N-YHNR] (noting that the reform is positioned to preserve London’s competitiveness against arbitral centers such as Singapore, Hong Kong, and Paris).
[4] See Caher et al., supra note 2.
[5] Enka Insaat Ve Sanayi A.S. v. OOO Ins. Co. Chubb [2020] UKSC 38 (citing appeal from EWCA (Civ)).
[6] The English Arbitration Act 2025, London Court of Int’l Arb., https://www.lcia.org/the-english-arbitration-act-2025.aspx [https://perma.cc/VHM7-L5SV] (last visited Nov. 14, 2025); [2020] UKSC 38 (holding that the law of the underlying contract governed the arbitration agreement, creating uncertainty when a London-seated clause was governed by foreign law with less supportive doctrines).
[7] See id.
[8] Abu-Manneh et al., supra note 2.
[9] See id.
[10] See Kuchlin, supra note 3; Arbitration: The “Private Court” Process for Resolving Disputes, Davis Bus. L. (Dec. 5, 2023), https://davisbusinesslaw.com/arbitration-the-private-court-process-for-resolving-disputes/ [https://perma.cc/68ZL-67V2] (explaining that an arbitration tribunal is the panel of arbitrators appointed by the parties to resolve their dispute, functioning as a private decision-making body that can deliver faster and more specialized outcomes than a court); Thomas E Carbonneau, Judicial Approbation in Building the Civilization of Arbitration, 113 Penn St. L. Rev. 1343, 1352 (2009), https://insight.dickinsonlaw.psu.edu/fac_works/249 [https://perma.cc/EWR4-EX92] (noting the English judiciary’s historical skepticism of arbitration and its habit of intervening in arbitral decisions).
[11] London Court of Int’l Arb., supra note 6.
[12] Id. (allowing new grounds or evidence only where the party shows reasonable diligence and that admitting it serves the interests of justice).
[13] Caher et al., supra note 2.
[14] See Ben Giaretta, Changes to Arbitration Law in England and Wales – Arbitration Act 2025 Explained, L. Soc’y (Mar. 26, 2025), https://www.lawsociety.org.uk/topics/civil-litigation/arbitration-act-2025-explained [https://perma.cc/2NTP-VKTN].
[15] E.g., Abu-Manneh et al., supra note 2; Beeley et al., supra note 3.
[16] See Beeley et al., supra note 3; Manifest Lack of Legal Merit – ICSID Convention Arbitration (2022 Rules), World Bank Grp., https://icsid.worldbank.org/procedures/arbitration/convention/manifest-lack-of-legal-merit/2022 [https://perma.cc/J7WH-ZQMH] (last visited Nov. 20, 2025) (describing the “manifestly without merit” standard as a considerably higher bar permitting early dismissal only in the clearest, most obviously defective cases).
[17] E.g., Kuchlin, supra note 3; Caher et al., supra note 2.
[18] See London Court of Int’l Arb., supra note 6.
[19] Halliburton Co. v. Chubb Bermuda Ins. Ltd [2020] UKSC 48.
[20] See London Court of Int’l Arb., supra note 6; [2020] UKSC 48.
[21] Giaretta, supra note 14.
[22] See id.
[23] E.g., Caher et al., supra note 2; Beeley et al., supra note 3.
[24] E.g., Giaretta, supra note 14; Ong, supra note 1; London Court of Int’l Arb., supra note 6.
[25] See Giaretta, supra note 14.
[26] E.g., Abu-Manneh et al., supra note 2; Beeley et al., supra note 3; London Court of Int’l Arb., supra note 6.
