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LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL.
Draft Bill.
No. S. 13.-The following Bill is published for general infor-
mation:
C.S.O. 4315/38.
A BILL
[No. 27-29.11.38.-1.]
Short title.
New sections 28A-28F for Ordin- ance No. 2 of 1889.
Admis- sibility of document-
ary evidence
as to facts in issue.
INTITULED
An Ordinance to amend the Evidence Ordinance, 1889.
BE it enacted by the Governor of Hong Kong, with the advice and consent of the Legislative Council thereof, as follows:
1. This Ordinance may be cited as the Evidence Amend- ment Ordinance, 1939.
2. The Evidence Ordinance, 1889, is amended by the insertion of the following sections immediately after section 28 thereof:
28A.-(1) In any civil proceedings where direct oral evidence of a fact would be admissible, any statement made by a person in a document and tending to establish that fact shall, on production of the original document, be admissible as evidence of that fact if the following conditions are satisfied, that is to say—
(i) if the maker of the statement either-
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(a) had personal knowledge of the matters dealt with by the statement; or
(b) where the document in question is or forms part of a record purporting to be a continuous record, made the state- ment (in so far as the matters dealt with thereby are not within his personal knowledge) in the performance of a duty to record information supplied to him by a person who had, or might reasonably be supposed to have, personal knowledge of those matters; and
(ii) if the maker of the statement is called as a witness in the proceedings :
Provided that the condition that the maker of the state- ment shall be called as a witness need not be satisfied if he is dead, or unfit by reason of his bodily or mental condition to attend as a witness, or if he is beyond the seas and it is not reasonably practicable to secure his attendance, or if all reasonable efforts to find him have been made without success.
(2) In any civil proceedings, the court may at any stage of the proceedings, if having regard to all the circumstances of the case it is satisfied that undue delay or expense would otherwise be caused, order that such a statement as is méntioned in sub-section (1) of this section shall be admissible