The bye-laws made under the powers conferred by the Glasgow Corporation Tramways Acts 1870 to 1893 provide that it shall be lawful for any officer or servant of the Corporation to seize and detain any passenger attempting to evade payment of his fare whose name or residence is unknown to such officer or servant.
In an action of damages brought by a passenger against the Corporation the pursuer averred that he tendered in payment of the fare a penny slightly marked but not defaced; that the conductor refused to accept it and summoned a tramway inspector, who demanded another penny from the pursuer, which the pursuer declined to pay; that the inspector and conductor then called a police constable, and gave the pursuer into custody on a charge of refusing to pay the fare not with standing that the pursuer had offered them his name and address; that it was within the scope of their authority as employees of the defenders to give into custody any person attempting to evade payment of his fare whose name and address were unknown to them; that if they had exercised due care in examining the coin tendered by the pursuer they would have seen that they had no ground for exercising this power; that pursuer gave them his name and address at the time; that they, however, recklessly, maliciously, and in an excess of zeal, and in furtherance of the defenders’ interests, gave the pursuer into custody; and that the defenders as their employers were liable. Held ( rev. judgment of the First Division, who had dismissed the action on the ground that the pursuer had pled himself out of court by averring that the officials had acted outside the scope of their authority) that the pursuer’s averments fairly read meant that the defenders’ servants, acting in the course of and within the general scope of their employment, improperly exceeded the powers conferred upon their employers, and that accordingly the case must go to trial.
Observations per Lord Dunedin as to whether in this case the scope of employment need be put in issue.
Viscount Haldane, Viscount Finlay, Viscount Cave, Lord Dunedin, and Lord Wrenbury
[1922] UKHL 313, 59 SLR 313
Bailii
England and Wales
Police, Transport
Updated: 17 January 2022; Ref: scu.632803