Business Law Report: Tort of Negligence and Liability

This report provides an in-depth analysis of tort law, focusing on key concepts such as the tort of negligence, duty of care, and vicarious liability. The report begins by defining a tort as a civil wrong and explaining the concept of damages and injunctions. It then delves into the elements of negligence, including duty of care, breach of duty, and causation/damage, supported by case studies like Donoghue v Stevenson, and Cohen v. Petty. The report further explores vicarious liability, explaining the legal doctrine where superiors are held responsible for their subordinates' actions. A case study is presented involving a car accident to illustrate how vicarious liability is applied. The report concludes with a list of references, providing a comprehensive overview of the legal principles discussed.

Business Studies

Table of Contents
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................2
Covered in PPT...........................................................................................................................2
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................3
REFRENCES ..................................................................................................................................5
.........................................................................................................................................................5

TASK 1
A tort is a civil wrong that is committed against a person. This includes legal entities like
companies. According to this law, an individual has some interests which are protected by law.
An individual can protect these interests by offering a sum of money and this is known as
damages for infringement of a protected interest (HEIDI, 2016). Additionally, a person is issued
an injunction i.e. a court order to the defendant to refrain from doing something. Negligence in
tort has different meaning. An individual who is totally disregarding the safety of others and is
not injuring them is not considered as guilty of negligence. On the other hand, an individual who
try his best and falls below the standard set by the court and causes damages is liable. A major
part of Tort law is the law of negligence. There are several elements needed to be established for
a negligence to be actionable. There are three elements of Tort of negligence explanation of these
are as follows :-
 Duty of care – The defendant owned a legal duty to the plaintiff under the situation like
relation within plaintiff as well as defendant might create legal duty. For example, doctor
owns legal duty of their patient for providing them effective medical care (Hylton and
Lin, 2013). Thus, the suspect may owe a legal duty to behave or act with reasonable care
in a specific situation.
 Breach of Duty – the duty of care was taken but not demonstrated then in this situation it
has been proved that there is an breach of duty. The term "reasonably prudent person"
related to the legal standard which shows how the average individual will responsibly act
in specific circumstances. In simple terms, the suspect likely will be found neglectful if
after knowing the mistake done by him or her. In that situation individual is responsible
for the mistake because he/she have knowledge about it. This is known as breach of duty
when particular person neglect the mistake done by them or not fulfil their duty towards
person who is feeling pain.
 Causation/ damage - The third element requires that the plaintiff show that defendant's
negligence actually caused of his or her injury (Hylton, 2013). Sure, someone might be
acting negligently, but the plaintiff can only recover if this negligence somehow causes
the injury. Whereas, damage is the element which need that court have to compensate the
plaintiff for their injury (Nolan, 2013). Mainly compensation are in the form of monetary
like medical care or property repair.
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Case for Duty of Care - The main objective of duty of care in the tort of negligence is
developed by judges making decisions in cases. A case of Donoghue V Stevenson. In this case,
Mrs. Donoghue went with a friend to a cafe and that friend bought a ginger beer and ice cream.
The beer bottle was very dark and the content was not be seen clearly. After drinking some beer,
she poured the rest of beer out of the bottle (Robertson, 2012). She then saw a dead snail in that
bottle. Due to this, Mrs. Donoghue became ill as she was frightened of that dead snail in beer.
Mrs. Donoghue do not has direct claim against the shopkeeper or manufacturer according to the
contract as she did not buy ginger beer directly. But friend of Mrs Donoghue can claim against
the cafe in contract but she has not suffered any loss. As a compensation, she could get her
money back but no compensation will be given for illness of Mrs. Donoghue.
Case for Breach of Duty of Care - Cohen is guest of Petty and he was injured when Petty
lost control of his car and crashed into an embankment on the side of the road. Cohen got
permanent injuries and in case an evidence was introduced by showing that accident has
occurred because Petty fainted. This was an undisputed evidence as he had never fainted before
the accident. In the trial court, a directed verdict was made in favour of Petty and according to
law, no action can lie in negligence (Wright, 2017). The injury was caused by involuntary,
unanticipated and not in control of actor.
Case of causation/damage – Chester V Afshar [2004] 3 WLR 927 House of Lords,
Claimant is the person suffering through back pain from last 6 years. This became major issue
and she is not able to walk or control her bladder. MRI scan which show that there was disc
protrusion in the spinal column and she will advice for surgery. Mr Afshar is doctor and he know
that operation may not be successful and there is only 1- 2% chances of coming out through this
issue. Operation of Claimant was done but she is not still able to walk due to plain and operation
was not successful (Keren-Paz, 2013). Then in court she said that she don't have any idea about
it, if this was discussed by her in advance then she will not going to take risk of operation.
TASK 2
Covered in PPT
TASK 3
Vicarious liability refers to the legal doctrine under which secondary liability is managed
by superiors for their subordinates in order to maintain positive environment. In this superiors
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work as third party who holds right and ability to control different non worthy activities (Foster,
2018). It is basically done for saving one person from blame that might influence their career in
negatively. For instance, employer or superior manager of company takes initiative to discuss
and take strict action towards those workers who have done any thing wrong or might have
indulge into unethical step. This step might have been taken by their frequent manager or quick
superiors but in order to maintain their relationships with workers, this kind of strict action is
taken by superior management or employer (Spindler, 2017). In order to understand this
Vicarious Liability, one case has been chosen in order to understand it in better manner. The case
study is based on a couple who owned common car which was used by both of them for their
own purpose. In legal documents the car was registered on the name wife. But, in actuality the
car was used by Husband at regular basis for office use and the wife was only using it on
weekends for shopping purpose. The husband was concerned about wife their car was registered
on wife's name. By observing this, husband has took decision that if in any he will not feel good
or drunk then in this situations husband will ask his friend to drive him back to home for safety
purpose. One day husband have gone to office and planned to hang out with friends. The person
have informed his wife about the plan. Later, husband got excessive drunk in parties and social
club and asked Mr. C to drive him back to home as he was not in the condition to drive properly.
But, Mr. C have asked three more respondents to drop them back to home. At this time, husband
was in a sleep inducing condition due to excessive drink. Further, without consulting anyone Mr.
C have decided to went on meal without consulting with any one. This decision have made them
all in problematic situations in which they met with an accident. This accident was occurred due
to carelessness of Mr. C. In this, accident Mr. C and husband died and remaining respondents
were injured heavily. Later on, these three injured respondents have filed case on Wife as she
was legal owner of the car from which accident was held. The wife has also appealed on court
that she is not the one due to which this situation was occurred. But, court have dismissed this
appeal as they felt that wife is vicariously liable for the negligence of Mr. C's inappropriate
driving which have resulted in the death of two people. According to the judgement, it is the
responsibility of Wife to manage things related that car. Vicarious Liability also states that in
context of motor vehicles, it can said that no matters who is driving the car but according to this
liability it is assumed that so who so ever is driving the car but it is being used for owners
purpose along with their permission. Therefore, ultimately it is the liability of owner (Wife) for
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the misshapen which is done due to this situation. Thus, it can be said that decision which will
be made by Judge will be declared in against of Wife as the seen is related to Vicariously
liability which simply means that the situation in which one person is responsible for misconduct
done by another person (McLellan and Frederick, 2017).
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REFRENCES
Books and Journal
Foster, N. J., 2018. Tort Liability of Churches for Clergy Child Abuse after the Royal
Commission: Implications of Developments in the Law of Vicarious Liability and Non-
Delegable Duty.
Gray, A., 2018. The enterprise risk theory of vicarious liability. Australian Business Law
Review. 46(3). pp.178-196.
HEIDI, M.H., 2016. The innocence of negligence. Contemporary Readings in Law and Social
Justice. 8(2). pp.48-95.
Hylton, K.N. and Lin, H., 2013. Negligence, causation, and incentives for care. International
Review of Law and Economics. 35. pp.80-89.
Hylton, K.N., 2013. Causation in tort law: A reconsideration. Research Handbook on the
Economics of Torts, p.97.
Keren-Paz, T., 2013. Torts, egalitarianism and distributive justice. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd..
McLellan, D. and Frederick, M., 2017. Innocence Compensation: Vicarious Liability and
Indemnification by the State for the Harms Caused by Wrongful Convictions. Available
at SSRN 3086607.
Nolan, D., 2013. Negligence and human rights law: The case for separate development. The
Modern Law Review. 76(2). pp.286-318.
Robertson, A., 2012. On the Function of the Law of Negligence. Oxford Journal of Legal
Studies. 33(1), pp.31-57.
Spindler, J. C., 2017. Vicarious Liability for Managerial Myopia. The Journal of Legal
Studies. 46(1). pp.161-185.
Wright, J., 2017. Tort law and human rights. Bloomsbury Publishing.
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