Civil Procedure: The Nature of Pleadings

When you appoint a lawyer to represent you in a civil action, your lawyer may inform you that they will file some of these documents to the court inter alia statement of claim, statement of defence and/or counterclaim, and/or reply to defence and/or defence to counterclaim to the court. As a layman, you may not understand what those documents are and the purposes of filling those documents. Generally, those aforementioned documents are called pleadings. It is trite that parties are bound by their pleadings and are not allowed to adduce facts or raise an issue which they had not pleaded. This article intends to give its readers some understanding of the nature of pleadings.

• What Are Pleadings? Pleadings are material facts on which the parties rely to establish a claim or a defence. Pleadings could also be defined as written statements drawn up and filed by each party to an action stating his contentions at the trial and giving all such details his opponent needs to know to prepare his case in answer. Every pleading shall contain, and contain only, material facts on which the party pleading relies for his claim or defence. Evidence does not need to be pleaded in the pleadings. A party may by his pleading raise any point of law. Pleadings are in the form of the following documents:
  

  • Statement of Claim A statement of claim is a document filed in court by a plaintiff. The material facts regarding the subject matter of the dispute and the remedy or relief sought will be set out in the statement of claim.
    

  • Statement of Defence and Counterclaim A statement of defence is a document filed in court by the defendant stating his defence to the claim filed by the plaintiff to dispute the plaintiff’s claim. If the defendant has any counterclaim against the plaintiff, the defendant may file his counterclaim against the plaintiff together with the defence instead of initiating a separate suit against the plaintiff.
    

  • Reply to Defence and Defence to Counterclaim A reply to defence is a document which is filed by the plaintiff to the court to reply to the statement of defence after the statement of defence has been served on him. If the defendant has filed a counterclaim against the plaintiff, the plaintiff may file the defence together with the reply to the defence.
    

• What Are the Purposes and Functions of Pleadings?
  

  • To inform the court and the opponent on the issues of fact to be decided between the parties.

  • To require each party to give fair and proper notice to his opponent to prevent either party from being taken by surprise at the trial and to enable him to prepare his defence.

  • To provide a brief summary of the case of each party from which the nature of the claim and the defence may be easily apprehended.

  • To prevent future litigation upon matters already been adjudicated upon between the litigants.
    

• What Are the Significance of Pleadings? Malaysia is adopting the adversarial system which means that the role of the judge is mainly passive and it is not open for the judge to enquire beyond the facts and evidence that are presented by the lawyers. In view of that, the judge could not enquire and/or decide beyond facts or issues which are not raised by the parties in pleadings. A party is bound by his pleadings and his case is confined to the issues raised on the pleadings unless and until they are amended (see Narayanan v Kannamah [1993] 3 MLJ 730). If a vital issue is not raised in pleadings, it could not be allowed to be argued and to succeed on appeal (see Lee Ah Chor v Southern Bank Bhd [1991] 1 MLJ 428). In short, your case may be jeopardised if certain material facts and/or issues are not pleaded or raised in pleadings as you are bound by your pleadings throughout the disposal of your case.
  

• When Are Pleadings Deemed to be Closed? The pleadings are deemed to be closed 14 days after the service of reply to defence and defence to a counterclaim or 14 days after the service of the statement of defence if no reply to defence and/or defence to a counterclaim is filed.
  

• Can any further pleadings be filed once pleadings are deemed to be closed? Further pleadings may be filed with the leave of court.
  

Premised on what has been discussed above, it could be seen the importance of pleadings. Hence, at the preliminary stage of your case, you should furnish all the relevant facts, information and/or documents to your lawyer so that all the relevant facts and issues are pleaded in the pleadings.

This article is only intended to provide general information to our Firm's clients and it should not be regarded as professional legal advice. Should you require any professional legal advice, you are advised to consult us.