1. Tort Law
Unit 2 AOS 1:
Torts, including negligence, defamation and related defences

2. The law of torts is a major area of common law
The law of torts is a major area of common law. Tort is a French word meaning ‘wrong’ A tort is a civil wrong: a wrong that allows the individual who has suffered an injury to take civil action.

3. Torts
The law of torts is designed to give a person a remedy for suffering some form of damage or harm due to the actions of another person.

4. THE TORT OF NEGLIGENCE
Negligence is concerned with the careless actions that result in loss.
Consider the following case…

5. The mouse in the bread
A 52 year old electrical engineer, John Jonas Vince, cut a slice from a loaf of bread and ate it. He cut another slice and was about to eat it when he noticed something the size of a 20 cent piece in it. It was dead mouse. Vince realised that he had eaten part of a dead mouse and immediately vomited. Since then he has been unable to eat bread and for a period immediately afterwards, simply thinking abut bread caused nausea and headaches. He developed a phobia about bread. He is unable to visit restaurants because the sight of people eating bread is sufficient to make him sick. He is unable to eat meals with the rest of the family if the meal consists of bread, cakes or similar products. He no longer visits friends for fear of being sick if he sees bread consumed.

6. The mouse in the bread
Can Vince take legal action? To answer this we must consider 2 points:
Does Vince have a civil right that may give rise to action?
What damage has he suffered?

7. Negligence
Negligence occurs when a person behaves in a careless or reckless manner that results in an injury to another. To determine whether the facts in this case involve a careless or reckless act- we need to look at the precedents set in previous cases.

8. Snail in the bottle The judge’s ratio decidendi was:
“a manufacturer of products which…he intends for the ultimate consumer in the form in which they left him, with no possibility of intermediate examination, and with the knowledge that absence of reasonable care in the preparation or putting up of the products will result in injury to the consumer’s life or property, owes a duty of care to the consumer to take reasonable care”

9. Precedent set
A duty of care is now placed on everyone, not just manufacturers, under certain circumstances. For example, road users have a duty of care to others who may be affected by their actions.

10. Elements of Negligence
There are 3 elements of negligence that must be proven in order for a claim to be successful:
The defendant owed a duty of care
The defendant breached that duty of care
The plaintiff suffered as a result

11. How do we establish duty of care?
Are the two parties ‘neighbours’?
Was the risk foreseeable?
Was the risk significant or not significant?
In the circumstances, would a reasonable person in the same position have taken precautions to eliminate the harm?

12. Loss suffered
In civil cases, those injured receive ‘damages’ these are intended to help restore the party to their original position before the incident occurred, as much as money is able to. SO, unless the plaintiff actually suffered injury, and needs to be compensated in some way, they will not succeed in a negligence claim.

13. Case A
A water-ski club built a jetty at a remote and relatively undeveloped lake. The local council had dredged a channel nearby to allow boats to travel more easily. A council employee erected signs near the channel stating ‘deep water’. The plaintiff was inexperienced at waterskiing. He fell over while skiing, hit his head and became a quadriplegic. The plaintiff sued the club and the council, arguing he was misled by the signs into believing the entire lake was deep, and not just the area near the channel. He stated that if he had known the lake was generally shallow, he wouldn’t have skied there.

14. Were the two parties ‘neighbours’?
Was the risk foreseeable?
Was the risk significant?
Would a reasonable person in similar circumstances taken precautions to eliminate the risk?