Kuan Tao Sheng v The Hong Kong And Shanghai Banking Corporation Ltd

Judgment Date30 July 1998
Year1998
Citation[1998] 2 HKLRD 582
Judgement NumberFAMV10/1998
Subject MatterMiscellaneous Proceedings (Civil)
CourtCourt of Final Appeal (Hong Kong)
FAMV000010/1998 KUAN TAO SHENG v. THE HONG KONG AND SHANGHAI BANKING CORPORATION LTD

FAMV000010/1998

FAMV No.10 of 1998

IN THE COURT OF FINAL APPEAL OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

MISCELLANEOUS PROCEEDINGS NO. 10 OF 1998 (CIVIL)

(ON APPLICATION FOR LEAVE TO APPEAL

FROM CACV No.101 OF 1997)

_____________________

Between:
KUAN TAO SHENG Applicant
AND
THE HONG KONG AND SHANGHAI BANKING CORPORATION LIMITED Respondent

_____________________

Appeal Committee: Mr Justice Litton PJ, Mr Justice Ching PJ and Mr Justice Bokhary PJ

Date of Hearing: 30 July 1998

Date of Determination: 30 July 1998

_____________________________

D E T E R M I N A T I O N

_____________________________

Mr Justice Bokhary PJ:

1. This is an application for leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal. It is made by the 1st defendant. He is one of three persons sued by the plaintiff bank as guarantors of the indebtedness of a company named Enstrong Ltd. in the sum of $166 million plus interest. The 2nd defendant is his son. As for the 3rd defendant, a company which has gone into voluntary liquidation, judgment has gone against it in default of acknowledgement of service. But that judgment has proved an empty one.

2. The writ was issued on 8 September 1990. On 30 August 1996 the father issued a summons for the dismissal of the action for want of prosecution. The son took out a similar summons on the 2nd of the following month.

3. Those two summonses were heard together by Jerome Chan J who dismissed them on 29 April 1997, and handed down his reasons on the 7th of the following month.

4. Both the father and the son appealed to the Court of Appeal, which heard their appeals on 25 and 26 November 1997, and handed down its judgment on 17 February 1998 dismissing the same.

5. While the son left it there, the father sought the Court of Appeal's leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal. On 17 June 1998 the Court of Appeal refused such leave. And the father now seeks such leave at the hands of this Committee.

6. The Court of Appeal's reasons may be summarised thus:

(1) They were unanimously of the view that, contrary to the judge's view, it was permissible to treat delay after the writ but before the expiration of the limitation period as inordinate even in the absence of any delay after such expiration.

(2) And they were unanimously of the view that, contrary to the judge's view, the delay was inordinate.

(3) But they were unanimously of the view that the judge was entitled to find, as he did, that the delay was excusable or at least that the defendants were not entitled to contend otherwise.

(4) On the basis of (3) above, they were unanimous in dismissing the appeal.

(5) But Mortimer VP (with whose reasons Keith J agreed) said that the father had established serious prejudice and that he would have allowed the father's appeal if the bank's delay

has been inexcusable. The point here is that the father suffered a stroke in 1995 leaving him in no fit state to give evidence. Godfrey JA declined to consider the question of prejudice.

7. The Court of Appeal's judgment being interlocutory, leave to...

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