LAW OF TORTS

Law of Torts

Law of Torts

Introduction

Donoghue v Stevenson [1932] is one of the foundational cases by the House of Lords for the English tort law and the Scots delict law. The modern concept of negligence was created by this case. Donoghue v Stevenson [1932] also set out general principles about the tort law. It also set out principles that when one person will owe a duty of care to another person. The case is also called the "snail in a bottle case", or the "Paisley snail". There were a number of facts of the case. They involved Mrs. Donoghue, who drank a bottle of ginger beer in one of the cafés in Paisley (Heuston, pp. 1-24, 1957). There was a snail in the bottle. She fell ill after drinking beer and sued the manufacturer of the beer, Mr. Stevenson. The House of the Lords held the manufacturer of beer, Mr. Stevenson, responsible for snail in the bottle. He owed a duty of care to her. He had breached this duty of care. It was clearly foreseeable that his not making sure that the product was safe for the consumers would ultimately harm the customers. This assignment will analyze that how the courts' approach to determining the existence of a duty of care has evolved since Lord Atkin formulated the “neighbor principle” (Bagshaw & McBride, 2008). It will also include the essential factors that are now regarded as relevant in determining the scope of the duty of care in novel factual situations.

Discussion

Duty of Care

Duty of care is the first and the foremost element of negligence. This is related to the relationship that the defendant and the plaintiff have with each other. The duty of care should be such that there is a binding obligation on the defendant that he has to take a proper care of the plaintiff (Elliott & Quinn. pp. 196-206, 2007). This includes avoiding the cause of any injury to the plaintiff in all the circumstances of the case. Duty of care is established in two basic ways, which are as follows.

1.The claimant, as well as, the defendant are in one of the unique relationships as described by the law, and

2.The claimants and the defendant are outside of these relationships, in accordance with the principles which are developed by the case of law.

There are three principles of duty of care which were delineated in the Caparo V Dickman tripartite test (Steele, pp. 65-71, 2007). These principles are as follows.

1.The harm was reasonably foreseeable or not

2.The requisite degree of proximity between the defendant and the claimant

3.Is it reasonable, just and fair to impose a duty of care on the person? Are there any public policy concerns regarding this?

There are a number of the situation on which the court of law can apply the duty of care (Steele, pp. 65-71, 2007). These situations include,

1.Employer to employee

2.One road-user to another

3.Doctor to patient

4.Solicitor to client

5.Manufacturer to consumer

The Neighbor Principle

There are strict categories of negligence which were recognized by the common ...