The UK is a signatory to the Hague Convention on Choice of Court Agreements and so, where there is an applicable exclusive jurisdiction agreement between the parties in favour of the courts of a signatory state, that clause will take precedence. Otherwise, under the common law, jurisdiction is based on service of proceedings and so, if the defendant is domiciled in England or can otherwise be served here, commencing proceedings will be relatively straightforward. However, a defendant may still seek to challenge the English court's jurisdiction on the basis that there is a more convenient forum to hear the claim.
Where a defendant is located outside the jurisdiction, it will generally be necessary to obtain the court's permission to serve proceedings on them, unless there is an applicable jurisdiction clause in favour of the English courts. When seeking permission, the claimant must show a serious issue to be tried on the merits, a good arguable case that the claim falls within a relevant "gateway", and that England is clearly or distinctly the appropriate forum to hear the claim. The gateways are many and varied, but include claims in tort where damage has been sustained in the jurisdiction, a breach of contract committed within the jurisdiction, or claims for misuse of private information where detriment has been suffered within the jurisdiction. Where claimants seek to bring proceedings against both an English company and its foreign subsidiary, as is often the case in the context of mass tort claims, they may also avail themselves of the "necessary or proper party" gateway (Vedanta Resources PLC and another v Lungowe and others (2019)). In certain circumstances claimants may be able to show that the parent company owes a duty of care for the activities of its foreign subsidiaries (AAA v Unilever PLC (2018)), for instance as a result of the level of control the parent company exercises over the subsidiary's operations (Okpabi v Royal Dutch Shell (2021)).
The law applicable to the dispute will depend on the nature of the claim. In contractual claims, the governing law will normally have already been specified in the underlying agreement. The position in tort claims is less straightforward. The applicable law will generally be the law of the country where the damage occurs, but specific rules may apply in some circumstances, including in relation to product liability claims. Complex issues can, however, arise in multi-party proceedings where different governing laws apply to different claims. The English courts can, of course, determine cases on the basis of foreign law. However, the existence of different governing laws may well lead the court to determine that claims lack the "same interest" required for a representative action.