Case Nos: CL-2023-000206 and CL-2023-000207 - [2025] EWHC 1591 (Comm)

For Owners Huang Mei was called. The Defendants did not cross-examine her and therefore her witness statement stood as her evidence. Ms Mei was not involved in any of the relevant decisions taken by Owners, and in fact did not join Minsheng’s shipping department until 2018. Her evidence was to the effect that significant transactions at Minsheng would require board or Committee approval, and there was no record of board or Committee approval for entering into the General Agreement.

The Defendants argued that adverse inferences should be drawn from Owners’ failure to call appropriate individuals to give evidence to the court, relying on Ahuja Investments Ltd v Victorygame Ltd [2021] EWHC 2382 (Ch) and Efobi v Royal Mail Group Ltd [2021] UKSC 33. In Efobi Lord Leggatt JSC, giving the judgment of the court, said as follows at [33]:

Whether any positive significance should be attached to the fact that a person has not given evidence depends entirely on the context and particular circumstances. Relevant considerations will naturally include such matters as whether the witness was available to give evidence, what relevant evidence it is reasonable to expect that the witness would have been able to give, what other relevant evidence there was bearing on the point(s) on which the witness could potentially have given relevant evidence, and the significance of those points in the context of the case as a whole. All these matters are inter-related and how these and any other relevant considerations should be assessed cannot be encapsulated in a set of legal rules.

In my view there are insufficient reasons to draw any adverse inferences from Owners’ failure to produce more witnesses in this case.