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Personal Injury - From: 1930 To: 1959

This page lists 65 cases, and was prepared on 02 April 2018.


 
 Moulton v Poulter; CA 1930 - [1930] 2 KB 183

 
 Wilchick v Marks and Silverstone; KBD 1934 - [1934] 2 KB 56
 
Nicholson v The Southern Railway Company [1935] KB 558
1935


Personal Injury
There may be liability on a highway authority under the highways Acts, in the event that a person slips off the edge of a highway.
1 Citers


 
Grant v Australian Knitting Mills [1935] All ER Rep 209; [1936] AC 85; 105 LJPC 6; 154 LT 185; [1935] UKPC 2; [1935] UKPC 62
21 Oct 1935
PC
Lord Wright
Personal Injury, Negligence, Commonwealth, Contract
(Australia) The Board considered how a duty of care may be established: "All that is necessary as a step to establish a tort of actionable negligence is define the precise relationship from which the duty to take care is deduced. It is, however, essential in English law that the duty should be established; the mere fact that a man is injured by another's act gives in itself no cause of action. If the act is deliberate, the party injured will have no claim in law even though the injury was intentional so long as the other party is merely exercising a legal right; if the act involves lack of due care, again no case of actionable negligence will arise unless the duty to be careful exists." and "the appellant is not required to lay his finger on the exact person in all the chain who was responsible, or specify what he did wrong. Negligence is found as a matter of inference from the existence of the defect taken in connection with all the known circumstances"
Lord Wright said: "Mr. Greene further contended on behalf of the manufacturers that if the decision in Donoghue's case [1932] AC 562, 591, were extended even a hair's-breadth, no line could be drawn, and a manufacturer's liability would be extended indefinitely. He put as an illustration the case of a foundry which had cast a rudder to be fitted on a liner: he assumed that it was fitted and the steamer sailed the seas for some years: but the rudder had a latent defect due to faulty and negligent casting, and one day it broke, with the result that the vessel was wrecked, with great loss of life and damage to property. He argued that if Donoghue's case were extended beyond its precise facts, the maker of the rudder would be held liable for damages of an indefinite amount, after an indefinite time, and to claimants indeterminate until the event. But it is clear that such a state of things would involve many considerations far removed from the simple facts of this case. So many contingencies must have intervened between the lack of care on the part of the makers and the casualty that it may be that the law would apply, as it does in proper cases, not always according to strict logic, the rule that cause and effect must not be too remote: in any case the element of directness would obviously be lacking. Lord Atkin deals with that sort of question in Donoghue's case where he refers to Earl v. Lubbock [1905] 1 K.B. 253, 259: he quotes the commonsense opinion of Mathew L.J.: 'It is impossible to accept such a wide proposition, and, indeed, it is difficult to see how, if it were the law, trade could be carried on.'
In their Lordships' opinion it is enough for them to decide this case on its actual facts."
Lord Wright also said: "a thing is sold by description, though it is specific, so long as it is sold not merely as the specific thing, but as a thing corresponding to a description "
1 Citers

[ Bailii ] - [ Bailii ]

 
 Hillen and Pettigrew v ICI (Alkali) Ltd; HL 1936 - [1936] AC 65 HL(E)

 
 Shiffman v Order of St John of Jerusalem (Grand Priory in the British Realm of the Venerable Order of the Hospital); 1936 - [1936] 1 All ER 557
 
Rose v Ford [1937] AC 826
1937
HL
Lord Wright
Damages, Personal Injury
Damages might be recovered for a loss of expectation of life.
Lord Wright explained the object of the 1934 Act: "The purpose . . was to abolish in a special and particular way the rule preventing the prosecution of a claim in tort for personal injuries where the person who would otherwise be plaintiff or defendant in an action has died. The rule was expressed in the maxim 'actio personalis moritur cum persona'".
Law Reform (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1934 1
1 Citers


 
Bunyan v Jordan (1937) 57 CLR 1; [1937] HCA 5; [1937] ALR 204
1 Mar 1937

Latham C.J., Rich, Dixon, Evatt and McTiernan JJ
Personal Injury
(High Court of Australia) The plaintiff sought damages having been put to severe fright by a shot fired by her employer, the defendant.
1 Cites

1 Citers

[ Austlii ]

 
 Wilsons and Clyde Coal Co Ltd v English; HL 1938 - [1938] AC 57; [1937] UKHL 2
 
Owens v Liverpool Corporation [1939] 1 KB 394; [1938] 4 All ER 727; 55 TLR 246
1938
CA
MacKinnon LJ
Personal Injury, Damages
Four family mourners at a funeral appealed against rejection of their claims for damages for distress caused by witnessing a collision between a negligently driven tramcar and the hearse.The incident had involved no apprehension, or sight, or sound of physical injury to a human being. Held: The appeal succeeded. There is a common law right to a decent burial. Nervous shock is a “form of ill-health” “ascertainable by the physician."
MacKinnon LJ said: "one who is guilty of negligence to another must put up with idiosyncracies of his victim that increase the likelihood or extent of damage to him: it is no answer to a claim for a fractured skull that its owner had an unusually fragile one." and "It may be that the plaintiffs are of that class which is peculiarly susceptible to the luxury of woe at a funeral so as to be disastrously disturbed by any untoward accident to the trappings of mourning."
1 Citers


 
Philips v Whitely (William) Ltd [1938] 1 All ER 566; [1938] 54 TLR 379; [1938] 82 Sol Jo 196
1938


Negligence, Personal Injury
The plaintiff asked the defendants to arrange for ears to be pierced. The defendant referred her to a third party jeweller. The jeweller appeared to take proper steps to keep the wounds disinfected, but an abcess developed. Held: A jeweller could not be expected to take the same steps as would be taken by a surgeon, and in this case had taken all reasonable steps to avoid infection. It had not been shown that the infection entered the ear at the time when it was pierced.

 
Hale v Jennings Bros [1938] 1 All ER 579
1938


Nuisance, Personal Injury
The plaintiff recovered damages for personal injuries under the rule in Rylands -v- Fletcher.
1 Cites

1 Citers



 
 Dann v Hamilton; 1939 - [1939] 1 KB 509
 
Smith v Cammell Laird and Co Ltd [1940] AC 242
1940
HL
Lord Atkin
Personal Injury
The Regulations imposed an absolute obligation from the words "all staging . . shall be maintained." Lord Atkin said: "It is precisely in the absolute obligation imposed by statute to perform or forbear from performing a specified activity that a breach of statutory duty differs from the obligation imposed by common law, which is to take reasonable care to avoid injuring another."
Shipbuilding Regulations 1931 31
1 Citers



 
 Caswell v Powell Duffryn Associated Collieries; HL 1940 - [1940] AC 152
 
Noble v Southern Railway Co [1940] UKHL 1; [1940] 2 All ER 383
18 Apr 1940
HL

Health and Safety, Personal Injury
The deceased was killed by an electric train. He was employed as a as a fireman and attached to the locomotive depot at Norwood Junction, having piloting duties, so that when a driver did not know the railroad, he had to travel in the engine cab and show it to him. Having reported one night at the engine shed and was then told to go to East Croyden, travelling as a passenger from Norwood Junction Station by a train due to leave shortly. To catch that train he had to walk to the Junction Station. There was a recognized route had been specified as the right way since the locomotive depot was opened. The distance along this route, which was adequately lighted at night and perfectly safe, was 1,002 yards. There was, however, a short cut along the lines of the railway, the total distance of which was 841 yards. This route was dangerous because of live rails, various obstructions and electric trains. It was not lit at night and its use by employees of the respondents was strictly prohibited. The deceased took this route and was killed by an electric train coming up behind him. He had departed from the recognized and safe- route and was walking along the highly dangerous route in close proximity to the rails used by electric trains. His widow claimed workers compensation. Held: The claim succeeded. Proceeding to the railway station was to report duty and was during the course of his employment.
Lord Wright said: 'I have often reflected with sadness that the Act was to be administered with as little technicality as possible. Yet thousands of reported cases have accumulated round it and fresh ones are likely to go on accumulating so long as the Act remains in its present form. . . The fundamental and initial question in every claim under the Act must be whether the accident arose out of and in the course of the employment. That is a question of fact which can only be decided by the County Court Judge by applying his common sense and his knowledge of industrial conditions to the evidence ' However: "our duty is to follow the law as we believe it to have been laid down in the previous decision of the House of Lords."
Viscount Maugham said that three questions had to be answered: "First, looking at the facts proved as a whole, including any regulations or orders affecting the workman, was the accident one which arose out of, and in the course of, his employment?
Secondly, if the first question is answered in the negative, is the negative answer due to the fact that when the accident happened the workman was acting in contravention of some regulation or order?
[ Bailii ]
 
Camkin v Bishop [1941] 2 All ER 713
1941
CA
Goddard, Scott LJJ
Negligence, Personal Injury, Education
The Court heard an appeal by the school from a finding of liability where boys from the school were allowed to help a farmer by working in a field, unsupervised, and one of them was struck so badly in the eye by a clod of earth thrown amongst them during horseplay that his eye was lost. The claim against the headmaster that he was under a duty to arrange for the supervision of the boys whilst they were doing the work Held: The appeal succeeded.
Scott LJ said: "The defendant, as headmaster, owed no duty to the boys to refuse to let them go to help the farmer in his need of labour without an under-master, or an under-nurse for that matter, in charge. The incident might have happened just as easily on a natural history expedition, or on any other country outing, on which the boys were regularly allowed to go without supervision. Indeed, it might have happened even if a master had gone for he might have been temporarily absent and the two boys who quarrelled might have done so during his absence."
Goddard LJ said: "The question we have to determine is whether there was any breach of duty by the headmaster, his duty being that of an ordinary careful parent. I ask myself whether any ordinary parent would think for a moment that he was exposing his boy to risk in allowing him to go to a field with others to weed beet or lift potatoes, occupations far safer than bicycling about on the roads in these days.
I confess that I have some difficulty in appreciating the view taken by the judge. He found that the defendant failed in his duty by reason of a lack of supervision. If this means anything, it must mean that it is the duty of a headmaster to see that boys are always under supervision, not only while at work, but also at play, or when they are free, because at any time they may get into mischief. I should like to hear the views of the boys themselves on this proposition. Would any reasonable parent forbid his boy of 14 to go out with his school-fellows because they might possibly get up to mischief, as all boys will at times? Here at this school on free afternoons the boys are allowed out, their bounds being some 8 miles, and they are left to themselves, provided they are back by a certain hour. No complaint is made of this freedom. If there is nothing wrong in that, how can it be wrong to let a boy go with others to such a harmless occupation as doing some farm work of the most innocuous character? As Clauson LJ put it during the argument, if the headmaster is not guilty of any breach of duty in allowing the boys to go off for walks and so on by themselves, how can he become liable because during the walk they go and work in a field and meet with some accident while thus engaged? If he is liable in this case, so will he be if some boy does a mischievous act in the playing field which injures another while a master or prefect does not happen to be present, or while out for a walk climbs a tree and breaks his legs . .
Nor was there any duty on the master to ask the farmer to supervise the boys for their safety. How could it occur to anyone that there was any danger in the occupation? If every master is to take precautions to see that there is never ragging or horseplay among his pupils, his school would indeed be too awful a place to contemplate. Of course there was no supervision on this occasion. Nor was there any duty to provide it, having regard to the innocuous nature of the occupation. This case bears no anology to those in which boys have been allowed to handle dangerous chemicals or to be in proximity to dangerous machinery. There was no evidence, in my opinion, of any breach of duty whatever.
Boys of 14 and 16 at a public school are not to be treated as if they were infants at creches, and no headmaster is obliged to arrange for constant and perpetual watching out of school hours. For one boy to throw something at another is an ordinary event of school life, but the fact that there was in this particular case a disastrous and wholly unexpected result is no reason for throwing responsibility on the master."
1 Citers


 
Bourhill v Young's Executor [1943] AC 92; [1943] SC (HL) 78; 1943 SLT 105; [1942] UKHL 5
5 Aug 1942
HL
Lord MacMillan, Lord Wright, Lord Russell of Killowen
Personal Injury, Damages, Scotland, Negligence
When considering claims for damages for shock, the court only recognised the action lying where the injury by shock was sustained 'through the medium of the eye or the ear without direct contact.' Wright L said: "No doubt, it has long ago been stated and often restated that if the wrong is established the wrongdoer must take the victim as he finds him. That, however, is only true . . on the condition that the wrong has been established or admitted. The question of liability is anterior to the question of the measure of the consequences which go with the liability."
Lord Russell of Killowen: "In considering whether a person owes to another a duty a breach of which will render him liable to that other in damages for negligence, it is material to consider what the defendant ought to have contemplated as a reasonable man. This consideration may play a double role. It is relevant in cases of admitted negligence (where the duty and breach are admitted) to the question of remoteness of damage, ie, to the question of compensation not to culpability, but it is also relevant in testing the existence of a duty as the foundation of the alleged negligence, ie, to the question of culpability not to compensation."
1 Cites

1 Citers

[ Bailii ]
 
London and North Eastern Railway Company v Berriman [1946] AC 278; [1946] 1 All ER 255; 115 LJKB 124
1946
HL
Lord Simonds, Lord Porter, Lord MacMillan
Health and Safety, Personal Injury
A railway worker's widow sought compensation after her husband was killed by a train. Held: He had been involved in routine maintenance and oiling at the time of the accident and was not 'relaying or repairing' tracks. She was not entitled to compensation.
Lord Porter said that the word 'repair' contains 'some suggestion of putting right that which is wrong'.
Lord MacMillan said: "I recognise that when Parliament employs technical terms without definition in a statute dealing with a particular art or industry, courts of law are entitled to have the assistance of skilled persons in the interpretation of such terms. Indeed the present statute and rules contain numerous technical terms as to whose meaning in railway parlance evidence would be almost indispensable."
Lord Simonds said that a person is "not to be put in peril upon an ambiguity, however much the purpose of the Act appeals to the predilection of the court."
and "It is only by reference to the industry that the meaning can be ascertained . . It remains a question of evidence what the words mean in the industry. They are a term of art and it is by those skilled in the art that I must be instructed."
1 Citers


 
Royster v Cavey [1946] 2 All ER 642; [1947] KB 204
1946
CA
Scott, Buckhill LJJ
Constitutional, Personal Injury, Litigation Practice
The plaintiff sought damages after being injured on her way to work. The Crown nominated the superintendent of a factory in which the plaintiff was injured as its occupier in order to allow the claim which would otherwise have failed for Crown privilege. The court below had refused to allow this fiction. Held: The plaintiff's appeal failed. Crucial admissions on which the case had been conducted at first instance should not be accepted, because they were contrary to fact.
Scott LJ said: "As a matter of fact . . the defendant so named had nothing whatever to do with the accident; he was not the occupier of the premises; he had not been guilty of any negligence, nor of any breach of statutory duty under the Act. Those allegations, that he did occupy that position and was so guilty, were accepted by the defence to the extent of not raising the question of his personal position."
Buckhill LJ said: "The result is, in my view, that this court cannot pronounce judgment against a defendant when in truth and in fact he is not under any liability at all."
1 Cites

1 Citers



 
 Mersey Docks and Harbour Board v Coggins and Griffith (Liverpool) Ltd; HL 1946 - [1946] 2 All ER 345; [1947] AC 1; [1946] UKHL 1
 
Vyner v Waldenberg Brothers Ltd [1946] KB 50
1946
CA
Scott LJ
Health and Safety, Personal Injury
Scott LJ said: 'If there is a definite breach of a safety provision imposed on the occupier of a factory, and a workman is injured in a way which could result from the breach, the onus of proof shifts on to the employer to show that the breach was not the cause. We think that that principle lies at the very basis of statutory rules of absolute duty.'
1 Citers



 
 Redpath v Belfast and County Down Railway; CANI 1947 - [1947] NI 167
 
Heard v Brymbo Steel Company Ltd [1947] KB 69
1947
CA
Morton, Tucker and Somervell LJJ
Utilities, Personal Injury
The plaintiff was injured in an explosion at work arising from a short-circuit occurring because of breaches by the second defendants, the North Wales Power Co Ltd, of the 1937 regulations, 24 and 25. The 1899 Act applied, and it provided that undertakers would be liable for all accidents, damages and injuries happening through their act or "default". The word "default" was also found in regulation 39. Held: The power company was liable. Somervell LJ explained that the default, a breach of regulations 24 and 25, and which might cause damage or injury under regulation 39, was a default for which undertakers were answerable under the 1899 Act. They were liable not because the breaches of regulations 24 and 25 of the 1937 Regulations per se gave rise to civil liability, but because the default which constituted the breach of those regulations was also a "default" which made the company liable to pay damages under para 77 of the schedule to the 1899 Act.
Electricity Supply Regulations 1937 24 25 39 - Electric Lighting (Clauses) Act 1899
1 Citers


 
Almeroth v WE Chivers and Son Ltd [1948] 1 All ER 53
1948
CA
Somervell LJ
Negligence, Personal Injury, Nuisance
The plaintiff when crossing the kerb from a roadway tripped over a small pile of slates and was injured. The slates did not overlap the kerb. Held: The plaintiff was not guilty of contributory negligence. The slates "might easily not be noticed by a reasonably careful person crossing the road as the plaintiff did", talking to someone. Somervell LJ said that a person walking along a pavement does not have to keep "his eyes on the ground to see whether or not there is any obstacle in his path".
The ordinary principles of causation in tort are applicable to an action in nuisance. The obstacle was capable of being a nuisance despite its small size.
1 Citers



 
 Turner v Arding and Hobbs Ltd; CA 1949 - [1949] 2 All ER 911
 
Edwards v National Coal Board [1949] 1 KB 704
1949
CA
Asquith LJ
Personal Injury, Health and Safety
A regulation encompassed a requirement to take specified action, so far as it is reasonably practicable, in order to prevent danger. Asquith LJ discussed the term: ""Reasonably practicable" . . seems to me to imply that a computation must be made by the owner, in which the quantum of risk is placed on one scale and the sacrifice involved in the measures necessary for averting the risk (whether in money, time or trouble) is placed in the other; and that if it be shown that there is a gross disproportion between them – the risk being insignificant in relation to the sacrifice – the defendants discharge the onus on them."
1 Citers


 
Millar v Galashiels Gas Co Ltd; Galashiels Gas Company Ltd v O'Donnell [1949] AC 275; [1949] SC (HL) 31; [1949] UKHL 2; 47 LGR 213; 1949 SLT 223; 65 TLR 76; [1949] LJR 540; [1949] AC 275; [1949] 1 All ER 319
20 Jan 1949
HL
Lord Morton of Henryton
Health and Safety, Scotland, Personal Injury
A hoist mechanism failed, the employee was injured, and he sought damages from his employer under the Act. Held: The section imposes an absolute obligation to maintain work equipment in an efficient state or in efficient working order. The duty imposed was an absolute and continuing obligation, so that proof of any failure in the mechanism of a hoist or lift established a breach of statutory duty, even though it was impossible to anticipate such failure before the event or to explain it afterwards, and even though all reasonable steps had been taken to provide a suitable hoist or lift and to maintain it properly.
Factories Act 1937 22(1)
1 Citers

[ Bailii ]
 
Rose v Colville's Ltd 1950 SLT (Notes) 72
1950


Personal Injury

1 Citers



 
 Shearman v Folland; CA 1950 - [1950] 2 KB 43; [1950] 1 All ER 976
 
Pritchard v Post Office (1950) 114 JP 370
1950
CA

Personal Injury
Servants of the Post Office had protected a hole where they were working by surrounding it with their usual light fence but the plaintiff, a blind woman, stumbled through the fence and was injured. Held: The plaintiff's appeal failed. In this case, the sole cause of the accident was the plaintiff's contributory negligence. There was no special duty to protect the blind or infirm.
1 Citers



 
 Dooley v Cammell Laird and Co Ltd; 1951 - [1951] 1 Lloyd's Rep 271
 
Davies v de Havilland Aircraft Co Ltd [1951] 1 KB 50
1951


Personal Injury, Health and Safety

1 Citers


 
Dorman Long and Co Ltd v Hillier [1951] 1 All ER 357
1951

Lord Goddard CJ
Personal Injury, Health and Safety
A worker had to remove four corrugated iron sheets from a roof. He was injured and claimed under the 1937 Act. Held: A place can be a means of access at one time and a place of work at a different time but it cannot be both at the same time. A step on to one of the sheets while the worker was passing down another after its removal was a step not upon a means of access but upon a part of the place where the work was being done. Lord Goddard CJ said that it would be "too artificial to say that there were different branches of work according to which sheet he was removing at any particular moment."
Factories Act 1937 26(1)
1 Citers


 
McCarthy v Coldair Ltd [1951] 2 TLR 1226
1951
CA
Denning LJ, Hodson LJ
Personal Injury, Health and Safety

1 Citers


 
Best v Samuel Fox and Co Ltd [1952] AC 716
1952

Lord Morton of Henryton
Personal Injury, Negligence
The court considered liability for injury to secondary victims. Lord Morton of Henryton: "it has never been the law of England that an invitor, who has negligently but unintentionally injured an invitee, is liable to compensate other persons who have suffered, in one way or another, as a result of the injury to the invitee. If the injured man was engaged in a business, and the injury is a serious one, the business may have to close down and the employees be dismissed; a daughter of the injured man may have to give up work which she enjoys and stay at home to nurse a father who has been transformed into an irritable invalid as a result of the injury. Such examples could easily be multiplied. Yet the invitor is under no liability to compensate such persons, for he owes them no duty and may not even know of their existence."
1 Citers


 
Nicol v National Coal Board (1952) 102 LJ 357
1952
SCS
Lord Guthrie
Vicarious Liability, Scotland, Personal Injury
The court considered a claim against his employer after the plaintiff suffered injury after a breach of safety regulations by a co-worker. Held: Referring to Harrison v NCB: "It appears to me that that principle disposes of the argument against the relevancy of the pursuer's case on breach of the statutory regulations. Accordingly, I hold that the pursuer relevantly averred that the defenders are vicariously responsible for the fireman's breach of regulations 2(e) and (h) of the Explosives Order."
1 Cites

1 Citers


 
Edwards v Railway Executive [1952] 2 All ER 430; [1952] AC 737
1952
HL
Lord Porter, Lord Goddard, Lord Oaksey
Negligence, Personal Injury, Land
A boy aged 9 was injured on a railway line. He had been warned not to go onto the land and had found his way through a defective fence. He claimed in negligence. The fence had been breached by children with some frequency for many years before the accident. When defects were observed by the Defendant's employees, repairs were duly effected. These were required with frequency. The evidence was that the fence was intact on the accident date. Held: He was a trespassr and not a licensee.
Lord Goddard said: "repeated trespass of itself confers no licence . . how is it to be said that (an occupier) has licensed what he cannot prevent . . Now, to find a licence there must be evidence either of express permission or that the landowner has so conducted himself that he cannot be heard to say that he did not give it . . What then have they done in this case to lead anyone to suppose that they may go on to their property to play ?"
Lord Oaksey said: "In my opinion, in considering the question whether a licence can be inferred, the state of mind of the suggested licensee must be considered. The circumstances must be such that the suggested licensee could have thought and did think that he was not trespassing but was on the property in question by the leave and licence of its owner."
Lord Porter said that the first question to be decided was: "whether there was any evidence from which it could be inferred that children from the recreation ground had become licensees to enter the respondent's premises and toboggan down the embankment . . There must, I think, be such assent to the user relied upon as amounts to a licence to use the premises. Whether that result can be inferred or not must, of course, be a question of degree, but in my view a court is not justified in likely inferring it . . The onus is on the appellants to establish their licence, and in my opinion they do not do so merely by showing that, in spite of a fence now accepted as complying with the Act requiring the respondents to fence, children again and again broke their way through. What more, the appellants asked, could the respondents do? Report to the Corporation? But their caretaker knew already. Prosecute? First you have to catch your children and even then would that be more effective? In any case I cannot see that the respondents were under any obligation to do more than keep their premises shut off by a fence which was duly repaired when broken and obviously intended to keep intruders out."
1 Citers


 
Christmas v Caledonian Club [1952] 1 KBD 141
1952


Negligence, Personal Injury
A window cleaner. employed by independent contractors, came to clean the windows of a club. One window was defective, falling onto and trapping his hand, causing him to fall. Held: He had no cause of action against the club. The landowner was concerned to see that the windows are safe for his guests to open and close, but he need not be concerned to see that they are safe for a window cleaner to hold on to. The risk of a defective window is a special risk, but it is ordinarily incident to the calling of a window cleaner, and so he must take care for himself, and not expect the householder to do so.
1 Citers


 
King v Phillips [1953] 1 QB 429; [1952] 2 All ER 459
1952
CA
Denning LJ
Personal Injury
Denning LJ said: "there can be no doubt since Bourhill v. Young that the test of liability for shock is foreseeability of injury by shock." A person "who suffers shock on being told of an accident to a loved one cannot recover damages from the negligent party on that account".
1 Cites

1 Citers



 
 Taylor v Glasgow Corporation; SCS 23-Jul-1952 - [1952] ScotCS CSIH_1; 1952 SLT 399; 1952 SC 440

 
 Day v Harland and Wolff Ltd; 1953 - [1953] I WLR 906; [1953] 2 All ER 387; [1953] 97 Sol Jo 473

 
 Harris v Brights Asphalt Contractors Ltd; 1953 - [1953] 1 QB 617
 
Latimer v AEC Limited [1953] 2 All ER 449; [1953] AC 643; [1953] UKHL 3
25 Jun 1953
HL
Lord Oaksey, Lord Porter
Health and Safety, Personal Injury
The Appellant had recovered damages for injuries which he alleged had been the result of a failure on the part of the Respondents in their statutory duty to maintain one of the gang ways in their works in an efficient state. He slipped on a factory floor which had become flooded in an unusually heavy rain storm causing a mixture of water and oily coolant, normally confined to a channel, to coat the floor. Held: The employer was not negligent because it had done all that could reasonably be expected of it having regard to the degree of risk.
Lord Oaksey said: "On the question of the construction of section 25(1) of the Factories Act, 1937, I am of the opinion that by virtue of that section and the interpretation section 152, the respondents were bound to maintain the floors and passages in an efficient state, but I do not consider that it was proved that they were not in an efficient state. A floor does not, in my opinion, cease to be in an efficient state because a piece of orange peel or a small pool of some slippery material is on it. Whilst I do not agree that the maintenance of the floors is confined to their construction, I think the obligation to maintain them in an efficient state introduces into what is an absolute duty a question of degree as to what is efficient . . The question then is whether section 25(1) applies to things which are not part of the floor but whose presence on it is a source of danger. If section 25 stood alone I would say that it did not. No doubt the section is one dealing with safety, but, even so, keeping the surface of a floor free from dangerous material does not appear to me to come within the scope of maintaining the floor."
Lord Tucker said: "The learned judge seems to have accepted the reasoning of counsel for the plaintiff to the effect that the floor was slippery, that slipperiness is a potential danger, that the defendants must be taken to have been aware of this, that in the circumstances nothing could have been done to remedy the slipperiness, that the defendants allowed work to proceed, that an accident due to slipperiness occurred, and that the defendants are therefore liable.
This is not the correct approach. The problem is perfectly simple. The only question was: has it been proved that the floor was so slippery that, remedial steps not being possible, a reasonably prudent employer would have closed down the factory rather than allow his employees to run the risks involved in continuing work? The learned judge does not seem to me to have posed this question to himself, nor was there sufficient evidence before him to have justified an affirmative answer.
The absence of any evidence that anyone in the factory during the afternoon or night shift, other than the plaintiff, slipped or experienced any difficulty or that any complaint was made by or on behalf of the workers all points to the conclusion that the danger was in fact not such as to impose upon a reasonable employer the obligation placed upon the respondents by the trial judge."
Factories Act 1937 25(1)
1 Citers

[ Bailii ]
 
Greene v Chelsea Borough Council [1954] 2 QBD 127
1954
CA
Lord Denning MR
Personal Injury, Land, Negligence
Lord Denning MR said: "Knowledge or notice of the danger is only a defence when the plaintiff is free to act upon that knowledge or notice so as to avoid the danger".
1 Citers



 
 Adams v War Office; QBD 1955 - [1955] 3 All ER 245; [1955] 1 WLR 1116
 
Phipps v Rochester Corporation [1955] 1 All ER 129
1955

Devlin J
Personal Injury, Land, Torts - Other
A 12 year old child claimed damages having been injured trespassing on the defendant's premises. Held: An occupier who resigns himself to the occasional and perhaps inevitable presence of trespassers on his premises is not to be regarded as having assumed the obligations of a licensor. The court, looking at occupier's liability to trespassing children, noted the difference between big children and little children, that is "children who know what they are about and children who do not".

 
Adler v Dickson; 'the Himalaya' [1955] 1 QB 158; [1954] 2 All ER 397; [1954] 3 WLR 696; 98 Sol Jo 787; [1954] 2 Lloyd's Rep 267
1955
CA

Personal Injury, Contract
The defendants were the master and boatswain of the P&O passenger liner Himalaya. The plaintiff was a passenger who was injured when an insecure gangway slipped and he fell 16ft to the wharf. The plaintiff had a contract with P&O which excluded liability for such an injury: 'passengers . . Are carried at passengers' entire risk' and 'The company will not responsible for and shall be exempt from all liability in respect of any injury whatsoever of or to the person of any passenger . . Whether such injury shall occur on land, on shipboard or elsewhere . . And whether the same shall arise from or be occasioned by the negligence of the company's servants . . In the discharge of their duties, or while a passenger is embarking or disembarking, or whether by the negligence of other persons directly or indirectly in the service of the company, or otherwise by the act of God . . Dangers of the seas . . Or by accidents . . or any acts, defaults, or negligence of the master, mariners . . Company's agents or servants of any kind under any circumstances whatsoever.' The defendants sought to rely on that clause. The master had directed that the clause succeeded as a defence. Held: The defendants were liable. They owed the plaintiff a duty of care in tort. They should have seen that the gangway was properly secured. The defendants' contractual duty was to their employers but they also owed a duty of care in the law of tort to those who were liable to be affected by any carelessness on their part which was foreseeably capable of causing injury to such persons. It was their conduct which had given rise to the situation (the inadequately secured gangway) which was the situation which caused the plaintiff's injury. The contract was between the company and the passenger, and the company had not contracted as agents for their servants. The defendants were not able to take advantage of the clause.
1 Citers


 
Prince v Carrier Engineering Co Ltd [1955] 1 Lloyd's Rep 401
1955


Health and Safety, Personal Injury

1 Citers



 
 British Transport Commission v Gourley; HL 1955 - [1956] AC 185; [1955] 3 All ER 796; [1956] 2 WLR 41; [1955] UKHL 4

 
 Angus v National Coal Board; SCS 9-Feb-1955 - [1955] ScotCS CSIH_1; 1955 SLT 245

 
 Banks v Woodhall Duckham and Others; CA 30-Nov-1955 - Unreported 30 November 1955

 
 Morris v West Hartlepool Steam Navigation; HL 1956 - [1956] AC 552
 
Moore v R Fox and Sons [1956] 1 QB 596
1956
CA
Lord Evershed MR
Personal Injury, Evidence
The plaintiff, a workman in the course of his employment, was injured by an unexplained explosion. Held: The doctrine of res ipsa loquitur applied, no explanation for the explosion having been offered. "Res ipsa loquitur" is a rule of evidence based upon common sense.
Lord Evershed MR said: "It will be necessary, therefore, for me to consider in some detail the evidence produced before the judge. But I will anticipate at once my conclusions. If, as the judge thought, this was a case of res ipsa loquitur,that is, a case in which this accident having regard to all the circumstances in which it occurred, spoke for itself and led to the inference of negligence, then, with all respect to him, I do not agree with his conclusion that the defendants thereafter discharged that onus by calling four expert witnesses, the result of whose evidence was, after all, that the accident was inexplicable." and "It must, as I venture to think, always be a question whether upon proof of the happening of the particular event, it can with truth be said that the thing speaks for itself. The event or thing offending, may, or may not, produce that result. Not every accident has, without more, that effect. If, on a closer analysis of the happening and in circumstances, it does not in truth appear fairly to follow that the proper inference is one of negligence, then the case is not one of res ipsa loquitur at all".
1 Citers



 
 Massey-Harris-Ferguson (Manufacturing) Ltd v Piper; QBD 1956 - [1956] 2 QB 396
 
Lee v Sheard [1956] 1 QB 192
1956
CA
Denning LJ
Personal Injury, Damages, Company
The negligence of a car driver resulted in an injury to the plaintiff who was one of two directors and shareholders of a limited company and did outside work of buying and selling linen goods for it. As a consequence of the accident the plaintiff was unable for a time to do his work for the company, its profits were lower than they would otherwise have been and he received £1,500 less from it than he would otherwise have done. Held: The awrd of £1,500 for the reduction in his earnings through the shareholding. The company could not have claimed for the same loss.
1 Citers



 
 Bonnington Castings Ltd v Wardlaw; HL 1-Mar-1956 - [1956] 1 All ER 615 HL(Sc); [1956] 2 WLR 707; [1956] AC 613; 1956 SC (HL) 26; [1956] UKHL 1
 
Cavanagh v London Transport Executive Times, 23 October 1956
23 Oct 1956

Devlin J
Personal Injury, Damages
The deceased stepped onto the road just behind a taxi cab which was stationary or just drawing up. He neither saw nor heard an approaching number bus and walked directly into its path. He suffered a fractured skull. There was evidence that his mental processes became grossly abnormal. Some sixteen months after the accident he committed suicide. Held: The court was satisfied that "an irrational state of mind arising from his head injuries was a cause, if not the main cause, of his suicide." The judge "would, if necessary, hold that the plaintiff (the widow of the deceased) had discharged the burden of causation upon her and that the financial worry did not amount to a novus actus. But if, looked at independently of its origins it would amount to a novus actus, he was satisfied that the deceased's financial position in January, 1955, could be traced back to the accident."
1 Citers


 
Morris v Cunard Steamship Co [1956] EWCA Civ 7; [1956] 2 Lloyd's Rep 583
28 Nov 1956
CA
Singleton, Jenkins, Parker LJJ
Personal Injury

[ Bailii ]

 
 Richards v W F White and Co; 1957 - [1957] 1 Lloyd's Reports 367
 
Pigney v Pointers Transport Services Ltd [1957] 1 WLR 1121
1957

Pilcher J
Negligence, Personal Injury
Mr Pigney had suffered severe head injuries in an accident in the course of his employment with the defendant. He committed suicide eighteen months later. Held: The court considered whether the accident could be the cause of the suicide: "It is reasonably clear that when the deceased hanged himself he was not insane under the M'Naughten Rules. I should infer that the deceased must have known what he was doing when he took his own life and must have known that what he was doing was wrong. To put the matter in ordinary language, the deceased took his life in a fit of depression brought about by a condition of acute anxiety neurosis induced by the accident and injury which he had sustained eighteen months earlier.
On these facts I have to make up my mind whether the suicide of the deceased constituted a novus actus interveniens which serves to break the chain of causation between his injury and his death, or whether upon the ordinary principles which cover remoteness of damage in cases of tort, the death of the deceased man was caused by the injury he received due to the defendants' lack of care for his safety. I have no doubt on the evidence that the deceased would not have committed suicide if he had not been in a condition of acute neurotic depression induced by the accident. In this sense the injury which he sustained in the accident was a causa sine qua non of the accident. It is equally clear that the immediate cause of his death was that he hanged himself in a fit of acute depression. That he might do this was clearly a matter which could not reasonably have been foreseen by the defendants.
. . . I have next to consider whether the fact that the deceased took his own life at a time when he was, as I find, sane under the M'Naughten Rules debars his widow and administratrix from successfully prosecuting her claim against the defendants under the Fatal Accidents Act on the ground of public policy. . . . I prefer to base my decision on the grounds already stated, namely, that the deceased's irrational and no doubt felonious act in taking his own life did not break the chain of causation between his accident and his death."
1 Citers



 
 McAuley v London Transport Executive; CA 1957 - [1957] 2 Lloyds Rep 500
 
Ward v T E Hopkins and Son Ltd [1959] 3 All ER 225
1959


Negligence, Personal Injury
It is for the court to decide whether a person counts as a rescuer with entitlement to damages for psychiatric injury after witnessing an accident.

 
Sleafer v Lambeth Borough Council [1959] 3 All ER 378; [1960] 1 QB 43
1959
CA
Wilmer LJ
Landlord and Tenant, Personal Injury
The plaintiff held a weekly residential tenancy of the defendant local authority. The front door was defective and jammed. The tenancy agreement contained a covenant by the tenant to keep the flat in good and tenantable repair. When the tenant pulled at the door it came off causing him injury as he fell. He claimed damages for personal injuries. Held: The claim failed. There is no implied duty to repair a property on landlord, and no such implication could be based on the obligations on the part of the Lessee under a clause permitting the Lessor to view the property and to effect work necessary for upholding the building. Wilmer LJ observed: “I think there is much to be said for the view that Clause II of the Agreement, which requires a tenant to reside in the dwelling house, does by implication require the landlords to do such repairs as may make it possible for the tenant to carry out that obligation. At least it seems to me that that is a possible view.”
1 Citers


 
Baker v TE Hopkins and Son Ltd [1959] EWCA Civ 4; [1959] 1 WLR 966; [1959] 3 All ER 225
24 Jul 1959
CA
Morris, Ormerod, Willmer LJJ
Health and Safety, Negligence, Personal Injury
The defendant had employed to clean a well. In error a petrol pump was sued, which discharged carbon monoxide into the well. On two workers getting into difficulties, a doctor sought to rescue them. All three died in the well. The employer denied negligence as regards the death of the Doctor. Held: " Bearing in mind that danger invites rescue, the court should not be astute to accept criticism of the rescuer's conduct from the wrongdoer who created the danger. Moreover, I think it should be remembered that it is fatally easy to be wise after the event. It is not enough that, when all the evidence has been sifted and all the facts ascertained in the calm and deliberate atmosphere of a court of law, the rescuer's conduct can be shown ex post facto to have been misguided or foolhardy. He is entitled to be judged in the light of the situation as it appeared to him at the time, i.e., in a context of immediate and pressing emergency. Here Dr. Baker was faced with a situation in which two men were in danger of speedy death at the bottom of the well, unless something were done very quickly. He was a doctor, and he had been specially summoned to help. Any man of courage in his position would have felt impelled to act, even at the risk of his own safety. Time was pressing; immediate action was necessary if the men in danger were to be helped; there was virtually no opportunity for reflection, or for estimating the risks involved in an act of rescue. If Dr. Baker in such circumstances had instinctively gone straight down the well, without stopping to take any precautions at all, it would, I think, have been difficult enough to criticise him. But in point of fact he did take the very wise precaution of securing himself with a rope, whereby those on the surface could pull him up if he himself were overcome. The immediate cause of his death was the sheer mischance of the rope becoming caught on some obstruction, so as to make it impossible for those on the surface to pull him to safety. I do not think that, having regard to the emergency in which he was acting, he is to be blamed for not foreseeing and guarding against the possibility of such a mischance. On the contrary, I entirely agree with the view expressed by the judge that the defendants, whose negligence brought about the danger, must accept the risk of mischances of this kind. In all the circumstances, I find it impossible to accept the contention that Dr. Baker was guilty of any negligence either causing or contributing to his death."
[ Bailii ]
 
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