Journal Name: Singapore Journal of Legal Studies

Abstract:

In 2019, a new definition for strict liability was introduced to the Penal Code as part of the historic Criminal Law Reform Act. Since this provision, section 26H, was designed to clarify the law, this article explores whether it can achieve that goal. By examining the intellectual history and recent judicial practice of strict liability in Singapore, I argue that section 26H succeeds in entrenching the “formal” or “elemental” approach to the concept. This is an advancement over the legal thought of the pre-reform era, in which the compatibility of strict liability with the Penal Code was widely doubted. However, the usefulness of section 26H to the statutory interpretation of specific offences is questionable. Indeed, section 26H must itself be interpreted carefully, or the law may become dangerously unstable. This illustrates the elusiveness of legal clarity and the limits of criminal law reform via codification.