Helsingin hovioikeus; 2012-10-12; A, B; HelHO:2012:17
Decision by national courts in the field of European Union law — ECLI:FI:HelHO:2012:17
Date: 2012-10-12
Subject matter: Judicial cooperation in civil matters
Origin: Finland

82012FI1012(51)_ENG_SUMJURE
JURE summary
JURE summary
The French court ordered a company „A” (hereinafter the „plaintiff”), with its registered office in Finland, to pay “B” compensation for unlawful termination of employment. The compensation was composed of a fixed sum of EUR 14.274 and penalty fee of EUR 150 per day until the fixed sum had been paid.
The plaintiff applied to the Finnish court seeking that such judgment be declared as manifestly contrary to Finnish public policy and therefore non-recognisable and non-enforceable. The plaintiff alleged that the daily payment would place the defendant in a better position than where he would have been without the termination of the employment.
The Court of First Instance assessed the application under the Brussels I Regulation (1), which is a legal basis for foreign judgments to be enforced in Finland. The court concluded that the daily payment is not contrary to public policy and considered the application as the request for a negative claim, not having a support in Finnish law in such situation. The application was thus held manifestly unfounded and by virtue of Chapter 5(6)(2) of the OK (2) was immediately dismissed on the merits without issuing a summons.
The plaintiff filed an appeal reiterating the claim for refusal of recognition and enforcement of a foreign judgment and, alternatively, asking that the case be referred back to the Court of First Instance for further hearing.
The Court of Appeal stated that the Brussels I Regulation supposes that the party having need to have a foreign judgment declared enforceable usually presents a claim included in that judgment. However, the Regulation does not expressly state that the contrary procedure – the application for declaration of invalidity of foreign judgment – is prohibited. However, the diction of Article 33(2), which concerns the disputes in recognition of a judgments, indicates that the party who raises the recognition of a judgment as the principal issue in a dispute may apply for a decision that the judgment "be recognised". Based on this and based on legal literature, it is against the purpose of the Brussels I Regulation to apply for confirmation that foreign judgment is not recognisable. Moreover, the daily payment is, by its nature, a periodic penalty payment within the meaning of Article 49 of the Brussels I Regulation, according to which “a foreign judgment which orders a periodic payment by way of a penalty shall be enforceable in the Member State in which enforcement is sought only if the amount of the payment has been finally determined by the courts of the Member State of origin.” As the final sum of compensation is not yet known, the French judgment shall not be recognized in Finland at all.
It is true that the institute of “negative claim” is known in Finnish law, but it is aimed at confirming that there is no specific relationship between the parties or that one party does not have a specific right to the other party. In this case, it is the question of refusing recognition and enforceability of a judgment. The principle of the Brussels I Regulation is that the foreign judgments are recognised without special proceedings, thus being considered, in principle, equated with national judgments. Therefore, Finnish law must recognize similar situation as is seeking to apply to foreign judgment. However, Finnish law does not provide any option for a party to start a separate proceeding, which purpose would be only the confirmation that a decision of a Finnish court is not enforceable. Therefore, there is no legal basis in Finland to apply the institute of “negative claim” to such kind of application.
Based on the aforementioned, the application of the plaintiff has no support in the Brussels I Regulation nor in the national law and must be declared manifestly unfounded. The decision of the Court of First Instance was upheld without changes.
(1) Council Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22 December 2000 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters.
(2) Oikeudenkäymiskaari (Code of Judicial Procedure).