In what circumstances is it possible for a court to award exemplary damages in tort?

I. Introduction Exemplary damages, also known as punitive damages, are granted in some tort cases to "express the court's disapproval of what the defendant has done" . The principles of exemplary damages in tort laws are laid out in the decision of the House of Lord in Rookes v Barnard . In that case, Lord Devlin classified the cases in which the plaintiff is entitled to claim exemplary damages into three categories, namely: (1)"oppressive arbitrary or unconstitutional …

…exemplary damages, particularly because of the publicity of Ma and Yuen case. The Hong Kong courts still take a relatively conservative approach in exemplary damages. Such damages are really exceptional. Bibliography: (1)P R Ghandhi, Exemplary damages in the English law of tort, (1990) 10(2) LS pp 182-200 (2)Benjamin Andoh and Stephen Marsh, Civil Remedies (Dartmouth Publishing Company, 1997) (3)Stephen Todd, Exemplary Damages, (1998) 18 NZULR pp 145 - 196 (4)Atiyah, P S, Atiyah's accidents, compensation and the law (London : Butterworths, 1993, 5th ed)