Singapore Law Blog

The Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority (AVA) has made revisions to the Animals and Birds (Dog Licensing and Control) Rules. The revised Rules will come into effect on 1 Sep 07.

The Strata Titles Board dismissed the application by the majority owners of Horizon Towers to approve the sale on "technical grounds".

Owners of five fairly small adjoining freehold residential developments in Mergui Road have banded together to sell the properties as one medium-sized lot for up to $125 million. The properties - Norfolk Court, Mergui Lodge, Northern Mansion, Mergui Court and The Mergui - are located near Rangoon Road and Moulmein Road.

Pacific Mansions and Rivershire have both failed to attract bids from buyers willing to match the prices asked by their respective owners. The two developments are in the River Valley area.

Brunei will be implementing new rules to discourage smoking by banning cigarette advertisements and restricting smoking in public places.

The Law Society Arbitration Scheme (LSAS) was officially launched on 1 August 2007 at the Singapore Management University. The LSAS is a quick and cost-effective way for parties to have their dispute resolved by a binding but private process of arbitration.

The new Hong Kong Unsolicited Electronic Messages Ordinance, was published in the Gazette on June 1, 2007 and is implemented in two phases to regulate the sending of commercial electronic messages.

The Public Transport Council (PTC) will be further tightening the quality of service (QoS) standards for basic bus services provided by the two licensed public transport operators, SBS Transit Ltd and SMRT Buses Ltd. A key change is that the PTC will require the bus operators to run at least 80% of their bus services at headways or frequencies of not more than 10 minutes, instead of the present 15 minutes, during weekday peak hours. This change will be phased in over two years.

The Law Society of Singapore has amended its Legal Profession (Professional Conduct) Rules (the ‘Rules’) to ensure that that Singapore meet its international obligations required by the Financial Action Task Force (of which Singapore is a member country), an inter-governmental body set up to develop and promote policies to combat money laundering and terrorist financing and to monitor such activities.

The minority objectors to the en-bloc sale of Futura Condominium have appealed the Strata Title Board decision to allow the sale to the High Court.

On 24 May 2006 , Singapore Telecommunications Limited (“SingTel”) submitted an appeal to the Minister for Information, Communications and the Arts under Section 27(2) of the Media Development Authority of Singapore Act (“MDA Act”) against the decision dated 10 May 2006 of the Media Development Authority of Singapore (“MDA”) on exclusive carriage agreements.

Professor Timothy Endicott, Professor of Legal Philosophy at the University of Oxford, has been appointed as the first Dean of the Faculty of Law at Oxford. The appointment will come into effect on 1 October 2007.

The Islamic Religious Council of Singapore, MUIS, is proposing that all Muslims be included under the Human Organ Transplant Act (HOTA).

Presently, there are no provisions in the Insurance Act to govern the nomination of beneficiaries to the proceeds from insurance policies. MAS will be amending the Insurance Act to incorporate a framework for the nomination of beneficiaries. MAS had, in December 2005, issued a consultation paper on the proposed framework and MAS’ responses to the feedback received during the consultation were published in April 2006.

At its second annual Public Accountants Conference on 24 July 2007 at the Raffles City Convention Centre, ACRA launched 3 consultation documents: (i) ACRA’s Regulatory Strategy on Auditing and Corporate Reporting; (ii) ACRA’s Public Consultation on the Registration Framework for Public Accountants and the Path to becoming a Public Accountant in Singapore; and (iii) The Public Accountants Oversight Committee (PAOC)’s Ethics Committee’s proposed Code of Professional Conduct & Ethics.

The Ministry of Health is proposing to introduce a National Registry of Diseases (NRD) Bill. This is to enable MOH to collect relevant medical information for robust statistical analysis and health policy research to support formulation of effective public health policies on disease prevention and control.

The Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports (MCYS) announced details of the Social Development Unit's (SDU) accreditation framework comprising a Code of Professional Conduct, and Accreditation Criteria and Standards, for dating agencies and dating practitioners.

Tulip Garden has been sold to Shan He Investment Pte Ltd (a unit of Bravo Building Construction Pte Ltd) for S$516 million or about S$1,018 psf ppr. The deal was managed by Savills.

Second Reading Speech by Mr Lim Hng Kiang, Minister For Trade & Industry And Deputy Chairman MAS on the Commodity Trading (Amendment) Bill 2007 in Parliament on 17 July 2007.

Parliamentary Speech for the Second Reading of the Optometrists and Opticians Bill 2007 on 17 Jul 2007 by By Mr Heng Chee How at Parliament.

To promote charitable giving and develop Singapore as an attractive hub for philanthropic and other not-for-profit organisations, the Second Minister for Finance Mr Tharman Shanmugaratnam announced several changes to the taxation and regulatory frameworks for the charity sector in his 2007 Budget Statement.

Law Minister S Jayakumar told Parliament that the Chief Justice expressed deep concern over the recent case where a prisoner was mistakenly given extra strokes of the cane. The Chief Justice feels such mistakes may affect Singapore's excellent reputation and standing of the judicial system. The Courts are also considering automating processes with built-in checks to ensure such errors do not recur.

Second Reading Speech by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Home Affairs Wong Kan Seng on the Passports (Amendment) Bill in Parliament on 16 July 2007.

Second reading speech on Constitution of the Republic of Singapore (Amendment) Bill & Public Service Commission (Amendment) Bill by DPM S Jayakumar in Parliament on 16 July 2007.

The Singapore Management University (SMU) is pleased to announce the appointment of former Vice-Dean of Harvard Law School David N. Smith (史达伟) as the Dean of the new SMU School of Law. He will commence office on 1 August 2007, succeeding Interim Dean Associate Professor Low Kee Yang.