Hong Kong Ordinances

PARENT AND CHILD ORDINANCE - SECT 15

Failure to comply with direction

(1) Where a court gives a direction under section 13 and any person fails to
take any step required of him for the purpose of giving effect to the
direction, the court may draw such inferences, if any, from that fact as
appear proper in the circumstances.

(2) Where in any proceedings in which the parentage of any person falls to be
determined by the court hearing the proceedings there is a presumption of law
that that person is legitimate, then if-

   (a)  a direction is given under section 13 in those proceedings; and

   (b)  any party who is claiming any relief in the proceedings and who for
        the purpose of obtaining that relief is entitled to rely on the
        presumption fails to take any step required of him for the purpose of
        giving effect to the direction, the court may adjourn the hearing for
        such period as it thinks fit to enable that party to take that step,
        and if at the end of that period he has failed without reasonable
        cause to take it the court may, without prejudice to subsection (1),
        dismiss his claim for relief despite the absence of evidence to rebut
        the presumption.

(3) Where any person named in a direction under section 13 fails to consent to
the taking of a bodily sample from himself or from any person named in the
direction of whom he has the care and control, he shall be deemed for the
purposes of this section to have failed to take a step required of him for the
purpose of giving effect to the direction. (Enacted 1993) [cf. 1969 c. 46 s.
23 U.K.]