Negligence - Paper 2 Flashcards
What are the three elements of negligence?
Duty of Care, Breach of Duty, Breach must have Caused the Damage
What is Stage 1 of Negligence?
Defendant must owe the Claimant a duty of care
Which principle was established by Lord Atkin in Donoghue v Stevenson?
The Neighbour Principle
What is meant by the Neighbour Principle?
D must take care not to injure their neighbour, and neighbour is anyone closely and directly affected by D’s actions
What was the decision in Robinson v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire?
If there is an obvious duty of care, no need for the three stage test in Caparo
What type of situation will the Caparo test be used?
When the duty of care isn’t obvious, a novel situation
What is Stage 2 of Negligence?
D must have breached their duty of care to C
What is the definition of breach from Alderson B in Blyth v Birmingham Waterworks
Doing something a reasonable man wouldn’t do, or doing something a reasonable man would so (objective test)
What are the three categories D will fall into to determine the standard they should have met?
Expert/experienced person
Learner/inexperienced person
Child/young person
What is the standard of an expert or someone who possesses a particular skill?
The standard of other reasonably competent professionals (Bolam)
What is the standard expected of someone inexperienced or a learner?
Someone experienced and competent (Nettleship v Weston)
What is the standard expected of children?
A reasonable child of a similar age (Mullins v Richards)
What do risk factors do?
They either raise or lower the standard of care required
What does the probability of harm risk factor mean?
The reasonable person does not need to take precautions against very small risks, but needs to against bigger risks (Bolton v Stone)
What is meant by the seriousness or magnitude of the risk?
The court needs to consider how serious the injury could potentially be, the bigger the risk of a serious injury, more care needs to be taken (Paris v Stepney Council)
Explain the cost and practicality of precautions risk factor
If the cost of taking precautions to eliminate the risk is too great, D may not be in breach (Latimer v AEC)
What is meant by social utility of the risk?
If there are benefits for society from the risk, there will be no breach (Watt v Hertfordshire Council)
What is Stage 3 of Negligence?
The breach of duty must have caused the damage to C
Explain factual causation
It uses the ‘but for’ test: but for D’s actions or omissions, would have the damage have occurred? (Barnett v Chelsea & Kensington Hospital)
Explain legal causation
It relates to the remoteness of the damage, meaning if the damage was unforeseeable then it may be too remote and D will not be the legal cause (The Wagon Mound No 1)
What was the ruling in Hughes v Lord Advocate?
D need not predict the precise way in which the injury was caused so long as injury of the same type was foreseeable
Explain the thin skull rule
D must take their C as they find them (Smith v Leech Brain Co)
