Hot Stuff - Three Lessons from Feida Bus Consortium Pte Ltd v Royal Autoz Exporter Pte Ltd [2025] SGHC 141

Credit ricardo-gomez-angel

Lesson 1 = how to apply res ipsa loquitur in a fire case

Res ipsa loquitur is an evidential rule which reverses the normal burden of proof. It is a Latin term meaning “the facts speak for themselves”. When applied it means that a party has to show that it was not negligent. In Singapore the requirements are:

(a)     The defendant must have been in control of the situation or thing which resulted in the accident.

(b)     The accident would not have happened, in the ordinary course of things, if proper care had been taken.

(c)     The cause of the accident must be unknown.

In Feida Bus Consortium, the Defendant occupied a warehouse that it used for its car scrapping trade and the Defendant's workers were on site when the fire happened. The Defendant therefore controlled the premises and (a) was met.

The experts agreed that the fire originated from a Cherry brand car and the evidence suggested that the fire was likely electrical in origin. That said, there were divergent views on whether an electrical fault in the car causes the fire. In view of the evidence court concluded that the cause of the fire was unknown and (c) was met.

Where the Claimant failed was in showing (b). Previous cases had held that res ipsa loquitur does not apply if the evidence is equally consistent with negligent as with non-negligent causes. An electrical fault could have been triggered within the Chery car even as it lay dormant, with no one having turned its engine on. Without more, the state of the evidence could arguably be regarded as “equally consistent with negligence as with no negligence”. The Claimant had identified any act or omission by the Defendant which could have caused the fire.

The Claimant was thus unable to use res ipsa loquitur to show that the Defendant was negligent.

Lesson 2 = a person can owe sperate duties to prevent a fire from starting and prevent a fire from spreading. A party may also owe a duty to maintain effective and adequate firefighting equipment

The High Court held at [73] that the Plaintiff that the Defendant did owe the Plaintiff a duty to take reasonable care to prevent fires from starting or spreading in the Warehouse. On the facts, however, there was no breach. As such, the Claimant's claim failed.

The Defendant counter-claimed alleging that the firefighting equipment in the premises was not enough. The claim was based on an allegation that no water came out of the hose when it was used. However, the argument failed because the court preferred the evidence that water did come out of the hose.

The court noted that the duty to maintain firefighting equipment could fall on either party depending on the factual matrix. The court did not think there was sufficient commercial necessity to imply a term into the tenancy agreement to place the duty on one person. On the facts, the Defendant failed to explain why any tortious duty should fall on the landlord and not the tenant.

Lesson 3 = how to interpret contractual obligations to buy insurance

The warehouse which burnt down was not properly insured. The Defendant was obliged by clause 15 of the tenancy agreement  to insure against fire damage suffered by the Defendant.

The Plaintiff sued for a breach of clause 15. However, there was no explanation as to how clause 15 was relevant to fire damage suffered by the Plaintiff. As such the judge concluded that the breach of this clause did not entitle the Plaintiff to claim for any losses.

The Plaintiff argued that further insurance obligations should be implied into the tenancy agreement but failed to show the commercial necessity for them.

The court commented that the tenant’s failure to buy insurance does not necessarily absolve the landlord of liability for losses which the landlord’s negligence causes the tenant, even if such losses might have been covered by the insurance that the tenant should have procured. This would particularly be the case if there is an absence of any indication that parties intended the insurance to inure to the benefit of the landlord (and not just the tenant).

Donald Spencer