Whether a company director suffering injury at work could claim notwithstanding he had been the cause of the company’s default.
Held: ‘As a general rule the remedy for breach of a director’s duty of care is compensation for the harm caused to the company by the director’s negligence. That would have been the position in this case had the person injured been an employee or another person, for example a visitor who was assisting Mr Lewis. The harm to the company would in principle be the damages payable to the injured person and the company would in principle be able to recover that sum from the defaulting director. Here, the injured person was also the director. Although the company’s duty is absolute, whereas the director’s is to exercise reasonable care, skill and diligence, the damages payable by the director to the company will be the sum which the injured director/claimant would in principle be able to recover from the company.’
Ward, Longmore, Beatson LJJ
[2013] EWCA Civ 195, [2013] WLR(D) 102, [2013] PIQR P13, [2013] 2 BCLC 58, [2013] ICR 1069, [2013] 1 WLR 2783, [2013] BCC 381, [2013] 3 All ER 412,
Bailii, WLRD
Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 5(1)
England and Wales
Updated: 09 July 2021; Ref: scu.471732