Introduction

• The term 'tort' originates from Norman French and means 'wrong'.
• The law of tort is mostly found in the common law rather than statute law.
• Tort involves 'civil wrongs' such as trespass, nuisance and negligence.
• A person who commits a tort is referred to as a 'tortfeasor'.
• Trespassers will be prosecuted, while trespass is a civil law.
• Prior to the Norman invasion, Anglo-Saxon law dominated in much of England.
• Anglo-Saxon law usually required the payment of money to the victim for civil (and criminal) wrongs committed.
• Anglo-Saxon legal principles heavily influenced the growing common law that was developing after the Norman invasion in 1066.
• The concept of 'civil wrongs' was referred to by various names, but beginning at the end of the sixteenth century, the term 'tort' began to be increasingly used and started to replace the other terms.
• The English legal system is a common law system, heavily influenced by judicial precedent and largely uncodified.
• The common law system provided the means by which the law of tort could develop and grow through the decisions of judges.
• Some torts are relatively new such as negligence, which originated from Donoghue v Stevenson in 1932, and the Rule in Rylands v Fletcher in 1868.
• Wales originally had its own legal system, but the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542 introduced English civil law to Wales.
• Tort focuses on compensation of individuals in situations where their private individual interests have been infringed.
• Various torts include private nuisance, defamation, false imprisonment, trespass to land, and trespass to the person.