Sim Yang Rikki v Goh Chong Pheng

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Judge: Jonathan Ng Pang Ern
• Judgment Date: 24 November 2023
• Neutral Citation: [2023] SGDC 280
• Court: District Court (Singapore)
• Docket Number: District Court Originating Application No 9 of 2023, Registrar’s Appeal (State Courts) No 17 of 2023
• Hearing Date: 03 November 2023
• Citation: [2023] SGDC 280
• Year: 2023
• Plaintiff Counsel: Muhammad Razeen Bin Sayed Majunoon, Ng Kiat Han and Jai Prakash R P (Advance Law LLC)
• Defendant Counsel: Mahendra Prasad Rai (Cooma & Rai)
• Subject Matter: Civil Procedure,Discontinuance,Deemed discontinuance,Transfer of proceedings from Magistrate's Court to District Court
• Published date: 08 December 2023

District Judge Jonathan Ng Pang Ern:

This was the Claimant’s originating application to transfer existing proceedings in the Magistrate’s Court to the District Court. The Defendant resisted the application on the merits, but also argued that the Magistrate’s Court proceedings had been deemed discontinued. After hearing both parties, I dismissed the application. Dissatisfied with my decision, the Claimant has filed an appeal to the General Division of the High Court. These are the grounds of my decision.

Background

The parties’ dispute arose out of a road traffic accident that occurred on 4 September 2020. As a result of this accident, the Claimant commenced proceedings against the Defendant in the tort of negligence. The proceedings were commenced in the Magistrate’s Court on 17 February 2021 as MC/MC 1372/2021 (“MC 1372”).

MC 1372 progressed uneventfully through its initial phases. By 8 March 2022, MC 1372 had been set down for trial. At a pre-trial conference on 22 April 2022, the parties informed the Court that they had settled the issue of liability. Accordingly, consent interlocutory judgment was entered for the Claimant at 100% liability against the Defendant, with damages to be assessed, and costs and interest reserved to the Registrar.

Inexplicably, however, the consent interlocutory judgment was only extracted one and a half years later on 13 October 2023. During this period between the entering and extraction of the consent interlocutory judgment, there were only three filings made in MC 1372. All were made by the Claimant. And all sought the transfer of MC 1372 to the District Court via a mode that was procedurally improper: First, there was a “Request to Attend before Duty Registrar” filed on 7 November 2022 which sought “[a] hearing date to transfer [MC 1372] to a DC Suit”. This request was refused on a technical ground: the document was actually an “Other Hearing Related Requests” and should not have been renamed to a “Request to Attend before Duty Registrar”. Second, there was an “Other Hearing Related Requests” filed on 11 November 2022 which similarly sought “[a] hearing date to transfer [MC 1372] to a DC Suit”. This request was refused on the basis that it was not appropriate to seek orders or directions by way of request or correspondence. The Claimant was also directed to file the relevant application for the orders sought. Third, there was a summons (alongside a supporting affidavit) filed on 28 November 2022 seeking the transfer of MC 1372 to the District Court. This filing was rejected on the basis that the application was to be made to the District Court by way of originating application.

On 13 January 2023, the Claimant finally filed the present application as an originating application in the District Court. The application sought the transfer of MC 1372 to the District Court. The supporting affidavit comprised a total of ten paragraphs spread over three pages, and the only ostensible reason for the transfer was that the Claimant “[had] been advised that the quantum of damages [was] likely to exceed $60,000.00”.¹ After a series of five case conferences, the application was eventually fixed for a substantive hearing before me on 3 November 2023.

Parties’ submissions

In his written submissions, the Claimant submitted that, for the purposes of s 54A of the State Courts Act 1970 (2020 Rev Ed) (the “State Courts Act”), there was “sufficient reason” for the transfer as his claim exceeded the Magistrate’s Court limit of $60,000.² In this regard, the Claimant highlighted that his Statement of Claim in MC 1372 listed damages amounting to at least $74,658.42.³ Crucially, the Claimant then went on to explain that MC 1372 was mistakenly filed in the Magistrate’s Court because of a clerical error.⁴ According to the Claimant, there would be no prejudice to the Defendant since the quantification of damages in his Statement of Claim had always been common knowledge between the parties.⁵

On the other hand, the Defendant’s written submissions made the point, firstly, that MC 1372 had been deemed discontinued on 22 April 2023 (ie, one year after the consent interlocutory judgment was entered) pursuant to O 21 r 2(6) of the Rules of Court (2014 Rev Ed) (the “Rules of Court”).⁶ In any case, the present application should be dismissed for the following reasons: First, the Claimant’s very cursory supporting affidavit failed to show any material change in the Claimant’s circumstances which justified a transfer.⁷ Second, as the Claimant was involved in another accident just two days before the subject accident in MC 1372, the Defendant was disputing causation. However, a transfer would preclude the Defendant from doing so in view of the decision of the General Division of the High Court in Salmizan bin Abdullah v Crapper, Ian Anthony [2023] SGHC 75 (“Salmizan”).⁸ Third, several of the Claimant’s injuries were caused by the earlier accident and not the subject accident.⁹ Indeed, the Claimant was also involved in other accidents, making it difficult to ascertain which of his injuries were caused by the subject accident.¹⁰ Fourth, the Claimant had not quantified his heads of claim and had not presented credible evidence supporting these heads of claim. In any event, the Claimant had failed to show that his claim would exceed the Magistrate’s Court limit.¹¹ Fifth, the claim was now time barred. Moreover, by entering into the consent interlocutory judgment, the parties had submitted to the Magistrate’s Court’s jurisdiction.¹²

Issues

In view of the parties’ submissions, the issues that arose for my determination were as follows: First, whether MC 1372 had been deemed discontinued (“Issue 1”). Second, whether MC 1372 should be transferred to the District Court if it had not been deemed discontinued (“Issue 2”).

Issue 1: Whether MC 1372 had been deemed discontinued

Issue 1 was whether MC 1372 had been deemed discontinued.

Deemed discontinuance is provided for by O 21 r 2(6) of the Rules of Court, which states as follows:

(6) Subject to [O 21 r 2(6A) of the Rules of Court], if no party to an action or a cause or matter has, for more than one year (or such extended period as the Court may allow under [O 21 r 2(6B) of the Rules of Court]), taken any step or proceeding in the action, cause or matter that appears from records maintained by the Court, the action, cause or matter is deemed to have been discontinued.

Accordingly, Issue 1 turned on whether there was any “step or proceeding” within the period of one year from 22 April 2022 (ie, the day the consent interlocutory judgment was entered; see [3] above) that precluded the operation of O 21 r 2(6) of the Rules of Court. As mentioned earlier (see [4] above), the Claimant made three attempts to transfer MC 1372 to the District Court before filing the present application. All three attempts took place within the relevant one-year period: two were requests made to the Court, while the last was a summons that was rejected. In the course of oral argument, counsel for the Claimant, Mr Ng Kiat Han, submitted that the present application, which was also filed within the relevant one-year period (see [5] above), was itself a “step or proceeding” for the purposes of O 21 r 2(6) of the Rules of Court.

In my view, the two requests made to the Court were neither individually nor collectively a “step or proceeding”. In Lai Swee Lin Linda v Attorney-General [2008] 2 SLR(R) 794, the High Court held (at [6]) that:

In AG v Tan Wee Beng [2002] SGHC 261, an AR observed (at [25]) that the words “step or proceeding … that appears from the records maintained by the court” in O 21 r 2(6) connote an action vested with the formality of the court adjudication process and that such a step or proceeding must therefore involve documents which are filed in court and therefore excludes correspondence with the court and correspondence between the parties. I agree with this observation but would opine that a letter to a judge requesting further arguments in cases where such a process is required by law would also fall within the ambit of “step or proceeding”. This is logical because such a letter is a necessary step preceding an appeal and is part of the litigation process to drive the case to its conclusion. [emphasis added]

Accordingly, a “step or proceeding” excludes “correspondence with the court” unless the correspondence is “a process … required by law”. In the present case, the two requests were plainly not processes required by law. To the contrary, they were improper processes for at least two reasons.

First, the power to transfer proceedings in the Magistrate’s Court to the District Court vests in the District Court and not the Magistrate’s Court. This much is clear from a plain reading of s 54A of the State Courts Act, which provides as follows:

General power to transfer from Magistrate’s Court to District Court

54A.—(1) Where it appears to a District Court, on the application of a party to any civil proceedings pending in a Magistrate’s Court, that the proceedings, by reason of its involving some important question of law, or being a test case, or for any other sufficient reason, should be tried in the District Court, it may order the proceedings to be transferred to the District Court. (2) An order under subsection (1) may be made on such terms as the court sees fit.

[emphasis added]

Second, an application to transfer proceedings in the Magistrate’s Court to the District Court must be made by way of an originating application. Section 54A of the State Courts Act makes it clear that the District Court’s power to transfer proceedings is exercised “on the application of a party” (see [14] above). This, in turn, triggers the operation of O 6 r 1(3)(b) of the Rules of Court 2021, which provides as follows: (3) A claimant must commence proceedings by an originating...