Equitable fraud – Some personal reminiscences and reflections

• Main Author: PHANG, Andrew B.L.
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2019
• Subjects: Asian Studies; Contracts
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/sol_research/4225; https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/sol_research/article/6183/viewcontent/Equitable_fraud___Some_personal_reminiscences_and_reflections____2019__13_J_Eq_114.pdf
• Institution: Singapore Management University

I would like to thank the conference organisers for their very kind invitation. It is a great privilege and honour to be amongst such an august gathering of legal scholars. I would like to begin by noting that the international nature of this Conference is emblematic of the nature of legal discourse today — in particular, the importance of comparative analysis. I have, in fact, dealt with this point elsewhere in the context of the law of remedies.1 In particular, Singaporean courts often engage in (to borrow the title of the late Lord Goff of Chieveley’s justly famous Maccabaean Lecture in Jurisprudence)2 the ‘search for principle’ and this entails (in turn and in appropriate instances) the consideration as well as citation of decisions from jurisdictions outside Singapore and England3 in order to distil the best legal principles available in the relevant area of the common law, regardless of their jurisdictional origin. Such an approach is especially needful in novel areas of the law.4 Indeed, beyond the role of the courts in employing comparative analysis in the development of legal principle, it is also desirable that legal scholars also adopt the same approach in their research and writing as well because their scholarship can become only more textured as a result.5 In this regard, I am glad to note that such an approach is not only exemplified in the make-up of the editorial board of the Journal of Equity but is also adopted by the many learned articles published in that Journal as well. This approach is also evident in the leading textbooks as well. Let me cite just one example. When I was a student many decades ago, I relied heavily upon the 10th edition of Professor Hanbury’s Modern Equity (or, to be more precise, Hanbury and Maudsley: Modern Equity, 6 and which, incidentally, I still have, for old times’ sake). I recently obtained the 21st edition by Professors Jamie Glister and James Lee. What struck me in this latest edition — almost 4 decades since I first encountered this brilliant textbook (now titled Hanbury and Martin: Modern Equity) 7 — was the Acknowledgements page.8 A hundred and thirty-eight persons were acknowledged and most hailed from a variety of common law jurisdictions including the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong and Singapore. And the book itself contains references to decisions from these jurisdictions as well.9 In this Conference, there is a similar representation. This is all to the good for the reasons I have just mentioned. It is also true to the very concept of a ‘university’ itself which, as the very word itself suggests, embodies the need for unity in diversity. 10 Long may such an approach continue.