Negligence - Causing Damage

• Third part of any negligence claim is for claimant to prove that damage suffered was caused by breach of duty and that loss of damage is not too remote.

  Referred to as damage, 3 things to consider:

  1. Factual Causation
  2. Legal Causation
  3. Remoteness of Damage
• Damage - injury/ property

  Damages - compensation
• Factual Causation:

  • Idea that breach of duty has caused injury or damage being claimed. Both factual and legal causation must be proved for a negligence claim to succeed.
  • Factual causation is 'but for' test.
  • Barnett v Chelsea 1969
• Barnett v Chelsea 1969:

  • Man unknowingly drank arsenic in his cup of tea
  • The doctors did not examine him properly and sent him home, where he died of arsenic poisoning.
  • Doctors did have a duty of a care and they did breach that duty of care - but were not liable because they could not have done anything to save him.
  • Therefore, their breach of duty was not the factual cause of death.
• Legal Causation:

  • For legal causation an intervening act can break the chain of causation.
  • Number of things could cause break in chain of causation such as:
  • The Claimant
  • Nature
  • A Third Party
• The Claimant:

  • McKew v Holland 1969
  • C was injured at work which caused his legs to give way.
  • C decided to descend some steep steps without a handrail, jumping the last 10 steps when his legs gave way, fracturing his ankle.
  • His employer was liable for the initial leg injury, but not the ankle injury - this was his own fault.
• Nature:

  • Carslogie Steamship 1952:
  • The Carsolgie collided with another ship, and admitted negligence and to pay for damage.
  • The other ship then suffered further damage due to storms whilst sailing to New York for the repairs.
  • The D was only liable for the original damage - not that caused by the storms.
• A Third Party:

  • Knightley v Johns 1982:
  • D caused a car accident in a tunnel.
  • Whilst dealing with the accident, a police officer was injured in a head on collision after he had been ordered by hi s boss to ride a police motorbike to the entrance of the tunnel to close in - driving into oncoming traffic.
  • D was not liable for this.
• Remoteness:

  • The damage must also not be too remote (far removed) from negligence of D:
  • The Wagon Mound 1961 (The key rule from this case is that):
  • The injury or damage must be reasonably foreseeable for Defendant to be liable for the negligence.
  • This case involved series of minor accidents leading to fire at Sydney harbour which caused £1 million of damage. D's not liable as damage was too remote.
• Remoteness:

  Two additional issues arise under Remoteness of Damage:

  1. Type of injury is foreseeable - not extent.
  2. Thin skull rule applies
• Type of injury needs to be foreseeable, not the extent:

  • Bradford v Robinson Rentals 1967
  • Bradford worked for Robinson Rentals and was sent to do a repair which involved 20 hours of driving with no heating in car.
  • Due to bad winter, he got frostbite.
  • Held: RR were liable as even if frostbite was not foreseeable as it is rare in England, and injury or some sort relating to extended exposure to cold was foreseeable.
• Thin Skull Rule applies:

  • Smith worked for Leech Brain and was injured when his lip was splashed with molten metal. This triggered pre-cancerous cells in his lip and e later died of cancer.
  • Leech Brain were liable for his death because they should 'tale their victims as they found them' - they were negligent in causing the initial injury and were liable for the full extent of that injury.