The inefficiency of efficiency tools: safeguarding natural justice in arbitral award writing

Successful challenges to arbitral awards based on breaches of natural justice are rare. Violations of natural justice triggered by arbitral tribunals copying the parties’ submissions when drafting awards are even more uncommon. While ‘copying and pasting’ from submissions, evidence, and procedural orders for efficiency purposes is not unheard of, doing so indiscriminately can compromise the integrity of the arbitral process. This practice may raise questions about authorship or create an appearance of bias or unfairness. This paper examines one of these unusual cases and explores the acceptable standards for ‘copy and paste’ in adjudicatory decision-making.