About the project

The Singapore Academy of Law’s Law Reform Committee recommended that the Carriage of Goods by Sea Act (Chapter 33, 1985 Revised Edition; now the 1998 Revised Edition) be amended urgently due to the inapt legislative technique adopted to give statutory force to the Hague–Visby Rules, which had given rise to a divergence of judicial views on the applicability and mandatory nature of the Rules. The proposed amendments would essentially clarify that the Rules are an overriding mandatory law in Singapore.

Project status: Completed

• The report was published on 29 November 1994.
• Parliament implemented the report’s recommendations in the Carriage of Goods by Sea (Amendment) Act 1995 (No 6 of 1995), which was passed on 1 March 1995 and came into force on 31 March 1995.
• The report was cited in the article by David Chong, “Legislation Comments: COGSA Given the Force of Law”, Asia Business Law Review (October 1995), issue 10, at page 69, footnote 1.

Areas of law

◾ Shipping law

Click on the image above to view the paper

Last updated 13 June 2019