Research On Legal Issues Of My Country’s Marine Insurance Guarantee System

The marine insurance guarantee system originated from the practice of marine insurance in the United Kingdom.In 1906,the British Marine Insurance Act implemented the system into a written law,and then extended it to all countries in the world,which make a great influence on the common law system and the civil law system.The United States,Australia and other Anglo-American law countries directly legislate on the basis of the British marine insurance guarantee system,and also make legal provisions for their own guarantee system.Among civil law countries,only Portugal,Spain and other countries have established a marine insurance guarantee system under the influence of the United Kingdom.Although this system does not exist in the legal system of most civil law countries such as Germany and Norway,they also creatively use risk changes system to play the role of the guarantee system.Although the functions of the two systems are similar,there is a big difference in the system norms.In China,Marine Insurance Guarantee is stipulated in Article 235 of the Maritime Law of the People’s Republic of China,which simply stipulates the notification obligation of the insured and the insurer’s right of relief after breach of the guarantee,and the rest of the relevant guarantee system is not involved at all.Although the judicial interpretation of the Supreme People’s Court has increased the practicality of my country’s maritime guarantee system,the relevant cases can reflect that there are still serious inconsistencies and uncertainties in judicial practice,and three major problems need to be solved urgently.First,the provisions of marine insurance guarantee are not clear,and the judicial practice identification standards are not uniform;second,the legal consequences of violating marine insurance guarantees are unreasonable;third,the rights and obligations of marine insurers and the insured are unbalanced.With the successive promulgation of the Maritime Law of the People’s Republic of China(Revised Draft)and the Maritime Law of the People’s Republic of China(Revised Draft),they have both improved and innovated the marine insurance guarantee system.However,there are voices against such reforms in the academic circles,that is,they advocate abandoning the system or replacing it with a risk change system.Based on the results of the official revisions issued so far,the author believes that improving the guarantee system should be the final choice for China.On the basis of the current official revision results,the author has the following three suggestions for improving my country’s marine insurance guarantee system: first,clarify the constituent elements of the guarantee clause;second,stipulate the legal consequences of violating the marine insurance guarantee reasonably;third,balance the rights and obligations of the marine insurer and the insured.