Qing Li & Ors v Fan Demetris Yuan & Anor

The court has a discretion to admit further evidence after trial, but exercises it cautiously. The discretion is informed by the principles that parties should present their whole case, litigation should achieve finality, and the decision must serve fairness, justice, proportionality and the overriding objective. Further expert evidence should ordinarily be refused where the opposing party has had no opportunity to test it, admitting it would require reopening the trial or a further hearing, and the evidence is unnecessary to determine the issue.

After the trial had concluded, the claimants applied for permission to rely on a supplemental report from their expert on PRC law. The report referred to additional PRC court rulings concerning the construction of a jurisdiction clause naming a court that no longer existed.

The application arose after the defendants had amended their Defence shortly before trial. The amendment was allowed by consent, and the expert was examined on the issue. The central question was whether the court should exercise its discretion to admit the supplemental report after the close of trial.

1. Application refused. The supplemental expert report was unnecessary to determine the enforceability of the jurisdiction clause. The court already had the codified PRC legal principles needed to decide the issue, and the meaning of the contract was a matter for the court rather than the experts.
2. The report did not reflect a significant change in the expert’s opinion. It merely added further references to PRC court rulings. The issue had also been apparent from the pleadings, the experts’ joint statement and the claimants’ own written submissions.
3. The discretion to admit evidence after trial is governed by fundamental principles. Parties should bring their whole case before the court, litigation should have finality, and the decision must accord with the overriding objective, fairness, justice and proportionality. Those principles were supported by ACL Netherlands BV v Lynch [2023] EWHC 1847 (Ch), drawing on the principles underlying Ladd v Marshall and the authorities there discussed.
4. It would have been unfair to admit the report without giving the defendants’ expert an opportunity to respond and without permitting cross-examination on the new material. Reopening the trial or holding a further hearing would have been disproportionate and would have increased the parties’ costs.
5. The application was therefore refused.