Lee Tin Yeung v. Chiu Chow Association Secondary School the Management Committee and Others

DCEC000951/1997

IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

EMPLOYEES' COMPENSATION CASE NO. 951 OF 1997

Coram: Judge Carlson in Chambers

Date of Judgment: 20 February 2001

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R U L I N G

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1. This is an application made on behalf of the respondents for specific discovery and the first matter that I am bound to observe is that this is an application that is made very late in the day, bearing in mind that the trial date was fixed some four months ago and the trial is due to take place on 1 March, which is in about nine days time.

2. It seems to me what has happened here is that - and this happens far too often - very much at the last moment, the respondents in this case who are making this application have gone off to counsel and he has given certain advice which has resulted in these two summonses, and I am afraid that is not the way to go about applications of this sort.

3. Having said that, a number of the matters that are required are proper requests for disclosure and on a limited basis I am going to make the following orders:

4. That the applicant makes discovery of the application forms and/or letters of application made by him to his employers post-accident. Secondly, that he produce documents which show his duties, and I would have thought either the job descriptions or the letters of appointment, but any documents which would show what his duties were, and lastly, I am going to require him to produce his wage records in relation to those two post-accident employments and that can be done within seven days.

5. I am not ordering him to produce any interview notes or remarks made by his employers. This is far too late to be asking for discovery on this sort of scale and similarly, I am not going to require him to produce any appraisal forms or working records, save for any appraisal forms or working records that are now actually in his possession. If he has got them, let him produce them within seven days, but I am not going to require him to go off and start making requests of his employers for those sort of records when the trial is only nine days away.

6. So, that is the limited discovery that I order on the first summons.

7. As to the summons which seeks for an adjournment, I am not sympathetic to that, but I am not going to dismiss it today. I am going to adjourn it to 1 March and the application can then be made, but it would have to be made on very proper grounds. It would be an application being made on the morning of the trial and, as I say, I am today not sympathetic to it and unless some very compelling reasons can be put forward, I am almost certainly going to dismiss the application, but I retain an open mind about it and that is why I am adjourning it today to 1 March.

8. Costs in the cause, and on the summons to adjourn I shall reserve those costs with Legal Aid taxation.

Representation:

Present: Mr Godwin Chan, of Messrs Hui & Lam, for the Applicant

Mr Chris Chuang, of Messrs Cheng, Yeung & Co., for all Respondents