Description

About the Seminar
In 2007, the Singapore Court of Appeal declared in Spandeck Engineering (S) Pte Ltd v Defence Science & Technology Agency “a single test … to determine the imposition of a duty of care in all claims arising out of negligence, irrespective of the type of the damages claimed”. This seminar evaluates the Court of Appeal’s landmark decision of Anwar Patrick Adrian v Ng Chong & Hue LLC in 2014 and its modification of the proximity factors to include an examination of a number of factors beyond the twin criteria to include factors like control, vulnerability and knowledge. It also traces how the High Court has subsequently approached the examination of proximity in 2014-2015, and posits that Australian duty of care jurisprudence might be significant in informing the application of the Spandeck test in the future.

About the Speaker
Associate Professor David Tan is Vice Dean (Academic Affairs) at the Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore, and oversees the academic curriculum for both undergraduate and master degreeprograms. He holds PhD, LLB (First Class Hons) and BCom degrees from the University of Melbourne and a LLM from Harvard. David pioneered the courses Entertainment Law and Freedom of Speech at NUS Law. He has been a visiting professor at Hong Kong and Melbourne law schools. His areas of research cover personality rights, copyright, trademarks, as well as freedom of expression – in particular First Amendment jurisprudence – and tort law. His law publications have appeared in a wide range of journals that include Harvard Journal of Sports & Entertainment Law, Yale Journal of International Law, Virginia Sports & Entertainment Law Journal, WIPO Journal, Sydney Law Review, Law Quarterly Review, Singapore Journal of Legal Studies, Media & Arts Law Review and Torts Law Journal. His forthcoming book on celebrity image rights titled “The Commercial Appropriation of Fame” will be published by Cambridge University Press.
His article, ‘The Promise of Universality: The Spandeck Formulation Half A Decade On’ (2013) 25 Singapore Academy of Law Journal 510 (co-authored with Goh Yihan), was cited with approval by the Singapore Court of Appeal in Anwar Patrick Adrian v Ng Chong & Hue LLC [2014] 3 SLR 761; SGCA 34