the duty of care
DUTY OF CARE
A Tort is a civil wrong, which is an action brought to enforce, redress or protect rights or noncriminal litigation. There are many Torts, however, of importance is Negligence. Negligence is the failure to do something a person of ordinary prudence would do. Negligence protect against personal injury, damage to property and economic loss. In order to establish negligence four elements must be established. Firstly, the plaintiff must prove that a duty of care was owed. Secondly, the defendant breached that duty. Thirdly, there was a sufficient degree of causation between the defendant’s culpable act and the plaintiff’s loss or injury. Finally, it must be evident that the defendant’s failure to act caused damage to the plaintiff.
The first aspect of negligence that needs to be satisfied is that a duty of care was owed. Duty of care may be defined as a legal concept which dictates the circumstances in which a person will be liable to another in negligence. Generally, a person owes a duty of care to those around him, which is a duty to act reasonably. The test for establishing a duty of care was formulated in the case Donoghue v Stephenson, where the plaintiff became ill after drinking lemonade manufactured by the defendant. The issue was that there was a duty in tort to take reasonable care to avoid acts or omissions which you can reasonably foresee would be likely to injure your neighbor. This is sometimes called the neighbor principle.
In order to claim a duty of care under the neighbor principle two elements must be present known as the Doctrine of Reasonable Foreseeability and the Doctrine of Reasonable Proximity.
BREACH OF DUTY
A Tort is a civil wrong, which is an action brought to enforce, redress or protect rights or noncriminal litigation. There are many Torts, however, of importance is Negligence. Negligence is the failure to do something a person of ordinary prudence would do. Negligence protect against personal injury, damage to property and economic loss. In order to establish negligence four elements must be established. Firstly, the plaintiff must prove that a duty of care was owed. Secondly, the defendant breached that duty. Thirdly, there was a sufficient degree of causation between the defendant’s culpable act and the plaintiff’s loss or injury. Finally, it must be evident that the defendant’s failure to act caused damage to the plaintiff.
The first aspect of negligence that needs to be satisfied is that a duty of care was owed. Duty of care may be defined as a legal concept which dictates the circumstances in which a person will be liable to another in negligence. Generally, a person owes a duty of care to those around him, which is a duty to act reasonably. The test for establishing a duty of care was formulated in the case Donoghue v Stephenson, where the plaintiff became ill after drinking lemonade manufactured by the defendant. The issue was that there was a duty in tort to take reasonable care to avoid acts or omissions which you can reasonably foresee would be likely to injure your neighbor. This is sometimes called the neighbor principle.
In order to claim a duty of care under the neighbor principle two elements must be present known as the Doctrine of Reasonable Foreseeability and the Doctrine of Reasonable Proximity.
BREACH OF DUTY