Importance of knowing the law a. Knowing the law may be useful in protecting your own interests, interests of your loved ones and your business. b. Law and business are intertwined and various aspects of doing business have legal implications arising under contracts of employment, agency, sale and purchase of goods and intellectual property rights. c. A basic knowledge of the law can prevent problems from arising in the first place and solve some problems that have already arisen. d. Help you understand legal advice, newspaper reports on court cases and generally facilitate the following of legal proceedings. e. Ignorance of the law cannot be raised as a defence in any legal proceedings.
Distinction between common law and civil law traditions a. Common law tradition – law that was uniformly/commonly applied to all the people in the country as a whole by the judges who travelled around the country, deciding on disputes. The same law was applied to all the people in the country to ensure there was consistency and fairness. b. Development of principles of equity – applying the principles of equity was seen to complement and soften, and in deserving cases, even override the strict application of legal rules which caused hardship to the claimants.
In Singapore Section 3 of the Civil Law Act (Chap 43 of Singapore Statutes), states that in every civil cause or matter commenced in the