A party seeking to amend pleadings must act bona fide and timely; late amendments that cause prejudice to other parties, especially close to trial dates, may be disallowed.

JUDGMENT

Christopher Chin Soo Yin JC:

(Enclosure 71 Application To Amend Defence)

Brief Facts

[1] The Plaintiff owned a barge ('the Barge') that allegedly floundered in heavy seas off the Solomon Islands and was lost.

[2] The Barge was insured by the Plaintiff with the Defendant insurance company. As night would follow day, the Plaintiff sought to recover its loss by claiming on the insurance taken out by them on the Barge.

[3] The Defendant is resisting liability under the insurance policy for the Barge and hence the suit by the Plaintiff against the Defendant.

[4] On the 8 January 2021 I had, during Pre-trial Case Management and with the approval of counsels, fixed the trial dates some 5 months hence on the 14th to the 18 June 2021.

[5] The Defendant's application to amend the Defence was filed on the 3 June 2021 barely 11 days before trial.

Ruling On Encl 71 In Open Court

[6] On the 8 June 2021 I heard parties on both encl 71 as well as encl 64 (Application for Stay). Enclosure 64 was an application for stay by the Defendant pending their appeal to the Court of Appeal against my decision in rejecting their application for discovery of certain documents and information from a third party being the Classification Society for the Barge.

[7] At the hearing on the 8 June 2021 I rejected both the Stay (Encl 64) as well as the application to amend (Encl 71) at the eleventh hour to amend the defence. Excerpts from the Notes of Proceedings follow. Mr George Lim was for the Plaintiff while Ms Charmaine Wong was for the Defendant:

"Mr Lim: Just for clarification my understanding is that today is for the for the application in respect of the stay (encl 64).

Ms Wong: That is also my understanding.

Mr Lim: There is an application for amendment but this has not being served on us.

Ms Wong: We have filed an amendment application on 3 June 2021 last week and we have yet to serve the hard copy to my learned friend. However we have opened access to my learned friend on CMS [and is] deemed served pursuant to the new ROC.

Mr Lim: I not aware until this morning of the filing of the amendment application and such I am not in the position to address on any matter arising from that application. However, I may be in the position to address on it should YA raise the matter in relation to the further conduct of this proceeding.

Court: You are aware of the trial dates. The trial dates were fixed 5 months ago but you chose to file your amendment to your defence eleven days before the trial. I find this unusual and appear to me to be delaying tactics. How can we proceed to trial if we amend the defence at the eleventh hour?

Ms Wong: The amendment application was filed eleventh day before the trial because it was only discovered during the discovery application in encl 37 which was decided on 3 May 2021 that the Defendant's defence had to be amended. Prior to the discovery application, the Defendant was not privy to information obtained during the discovery application. Hence, the Defendant has applied to amend this defence after the discovery application was decided.

Mr Lim: Factually, even after discovery the Defendant [was] already in possession of these documents as NKK [the Classification Society for the Barge which the Defendant had sought discovery of documents] made it known to them. So they have ample time to know the amendment is necessary if they wish to pursue notwithstanding the application to the Court for discovery but they sat on it. Thus, prejudicing us in the further conduct of the trial.

Ms Wong: The documents from NKK was only furnished to us on the 3 February 2021 and that time the discovery application was still ongoing and the Defendant was seeking to obtain further information in addition to the documents that were already mentioned by the Defendant. If an amendment application was made at the time when the documents from NKK was furnished to us on 3 February 2021, and if the discovery application was allowed for NKK to furnish further information to