Png Hock Leng v AXA Insurance Pte Ltd
Jurisdiction | Singapore |
Judge | Belinda Ang Saw Ean JAD |
Judgment Date | 09 March 2022 |
Neutral Citation | [2022] SGHC(A) 10 |
Citation | [2022] SGHC(A) 10 |
Docket Number | Civil Appeal No 102 of 2021 (Summons No 6 of 2022) |
Published date | 12 March 2022 |
Year | 2022 |
Plaintiff Counsel | Carolyn Tan Beng Hui and Kevin Leong (Tan & Au LLP) |
Defendant Counsel | Ang Tze Phern and Shaun Ou Wai Hung (Rajah & Tann Singapore LLP) |
Hearing Date | 09 March 2022 |
Court | High Court Appellate Division (Singapore) |
As noted by the Court of Appeal in
The Singapore courts have repeatedly cautioned against the making of unfounded allegations of judicial bias. Most recently, in
… we cannot emphasise enough
how extremely serious allegations of judicial bias are . Indeed, such allegations can be utilised not only as aweapon of abuse by disgruntled litigants but alsowaste valuable court time and resources in the process. We would imagine that, by their very nature, such allegations would be rare in the extreme. Should such proceedings arise before the court in the future and be found to be unmeritorious, there may be serious consequences. [emphasis added in italics and bold italics]
Similarly, in
The court has to be vigilant in order to guard against the use of unfounded allegations of bias to engage in judge shopping as a procedural strategy. It is important to ensure that litigants do not have the misconceived idea that they may pick their own judges or disrupt proceedings with such applications (
In our judgment, the present application, AD/SUM 6/2022 (“SUM 6”), filed by the applicant, Png Hock Leng, seeking the recusal of Justice Chua Lee Ming (“the Judge”) from his appeal, AD/CA 102/2021 (“AD/CA 102”), is simply another instance of impermissible judge shopping. We have no hesitation in dismissing his baseless application in full.
The relevant backgroundWe begin by briefly sketching the relevant background. AD/CA 102 is the applicant’s appeal against Justice Lee Seiu Kin’s decision in HC/RA 162/2021, which affirmed Assistant Registrar Kenneth Wang’s decision in HC/OS 171/2021 (“OS 171”), to dismiss his application to transfer the whole of MC/MC 146/2020 (“MC 146”) from the Magistrate’s Court to the General Division of the High Court.
In AD/CA 102, the applicant contends that he has the right to transfer MC 146 to the High Court under s 54E of the State Courts Act (Cap 321, Rev Ed 2007) (“SCA”) because his counterclaim in MC 146 exceeds the District Court’s jurisdiction. Alternatively, MC 146 ought to be transferred under s 54B of the SCA because there is “sufficient reason”, an important question of law or MC 146 is a test case and there would be no irreparable prejudice to the counterparty. The respondent, AXA Insurance Pte Ltd, opposes the transfer application.
On 28 December 2021, the parties were informed that AD/CA 102 was to be heard in the sitting of the Appellate Division of the High Court from 31 January 2022 to 11 February 2022. The hearing fixture list disclosed that the Judge would be on the coram.
On 5 January 2022, an adjournment was granted at the request of counsel for the applicant to refix the hearing date to the sitting of the Appellate Division of the High Court commencing on 7 March 2022.
Subsequently, on 9 February 2022, the applicant wrote a letter to the Registry of the High Court requesting that AD/CA 102 not be fixed before the Judge because the appeal concerned principles stated in
The applicant proceeded to file SUM 6 on 21 February 2022 seeking the recusal of the Judge from hearing AD/CA 102 and the stay of AD/CA 102 pending the outcome of SUM 6 including any appeals therefrom. We reproduce the grounds stated in his supporting affidavit dated 18 February 2022 as follows:
The applicant’s case for recusal is grounded on apparent bias. As the applicant seeks to argue in AD/CA 102 that
Given that Lee J and Wang AR dismissed the applicant’s transfer application in OS 171 on the basis of the principles stated in
The respondent opposes the recusal application on the basis that no fair-minded, informed and reasonable observer would reasonably suspect or apprehend that there would be bias on the Judge’s part and/or that the Judge would reach a final and conclusive decision on AD/CA 102 before being made aware of all relevant evidence and arguments which the parties wish to put before him, such that he approaches the matter at hand with a closed mind. It argues that the applicant has not identified any reason to support his allegation of apparent bias beyond his bare assertion that the Judge decided
The respondent argues that the court should view the application with great circumspection and guard against judge shopping.8 The applicant’s allegation of appearance of or apparent bias is plainly unmeritorious since it is only based on his own bare assertion and it is trite that a judge’s previous judicial decision is an irrelevant factor in determining whether apparent bias is present.9 It is also well-settled that judges have considered, on appeal, principles which they had enunciated in their earlier judgments.10
The applicable lawIt is...
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Pradeepto Kumar Biswas v Gouri Mukherjee and another
...evidence in support, and “bare allegations do not suffice to make out a case of apparent bias”: Png Hock Leng v AXA Insurance Pte Ltd [2022] SGHC(A) 10 at [19]. Indeed, it is clear on the evidence that Mr Biswas’s allegations are completely bereft of merit. We consider both in turn. The con......
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Panchalai a/p Supermaniam and another v Public Prosecutor
...(see the decision of this court in BOI v BOJ [2018] 2 SLR 1156). As observed by Ang JAD in Png Hock Leng v AXA Insurance Pte Ltd [2022] SGHC(A) 10 at [3], the court also has to be vigilant in order to guard against the use of unfounded allegations of bias to engage in judge shopping as a pr......