Source: https://legalresearch.blogs.bris.ac.uk/tag/employers-liability/
Timestamp: 2020-07-12 01:37:03
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employer’s liability – University of Bristol Law School Blog
Tag: employer’s liability
Posted on April 7, 2020 April 7, 2020 by lee.mcconnell
In Various Claimants v Catholic Child Welfare Society (CCWS) [2012] UKSC 56, Lord Phillips famously stated that “The law of vicarious liability is on the move.” This leading case also made it clear that two elements have to be shown before one person can be made vicariously liable for the torts committed by another:
a relationship between the two persons which makes it proper for the law to make the one pay for the fault of the other; and
a connection between that relationship and the tortfeasor’s wrongdoing.
Later cases such as Cox v Ministry of Justice [2016] UKSC 10 and Armes v Nottinghamshire CC [2017] UKSC 60 have shown that the relationship, while primarily that of employer and employee, can extend to relationships akin to employment, including the relationship between a priest and his bishop[1] and a local authority and the foster parents to whom it entrusts children in care. The Supreme Court in Mohamud v Wm Morrison Supermarkets Plc [2016] UKSC 11 also broadened the “connection” test to impose vicarious liability for torts which were connected to the field of activities of the employee, and where there was a sufficient connection between the position in which the employee was employed and his wrongful conduct to make it right for the employer to be held liable. (more…)
Posted in Bristol ScholarsTagged akin to employment, Armes v Nottinghamshire CC, close connection, Cox v Ministry of Justice, employer's liability, expansion, independent contractor, Mohamud v Wm Morrison Supermarkets Plc, Paula Giliker, policy rationales, Robinson v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police, sufficient connection, Various Claimants v Catholic Child Welfare Society, vicarious liability1 Comment on Vicarious Liability in the Supreme Court: Can we finally say it is no longer on the move?
Supreme Court rulings on vicarious liability: Cox and Mohamud
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“To search for certainty and precision in vicarious liability is to undertake a quest for a chimaera”: Lord Dyson (Mohamud)
On 2 March 2016, the Supreme Court delivered two judgments which it described as “complementary to each other” on the controversial topic of vicarious liability in tort. Vicarious liability imposes strict liability on an employer for the wrongful actions of (usually) its employees which are committed in the course of his or her employment. Recently, however, as Lord Phillips (former President of the Supreme Court) stated in the case of Various Claimants v Catholic Child Welfare Society [2012] UKSC 56 (“the Christian Brothers case”), “the law of vicarious liability is on the move.” Since 2001, it has been an area of law subject to expansion. The question on appeal to the Supreme Court was essentially how far this expansion would go, examining, in particular:
The relationship needed to give rise to vicarious liability. This was examined in Cox v Ministry of Justice [2016] UKSC 10.
The manner in which the wrongful acts of the employee have to be related to the relationship giving rise to vicarious liability – in other words, were the employee’s torts so closely connected with his employment that it would be just to hold the employers liable? This was examined in Mohamud v WM Morrison Supermarkets plc [2016] UKSC 11.
Both judgments are short and unanimous. Neither claim, however, to provide absolute tests, taking the view that a lack of precision is inevitable, given the infinite range of circumstances where the issues arise. (more…)
Posted in Bristol ScholarsTagged case comment, employer's liability, Paula Giliker, private law, tort, UK Supreme Court, vicarious liabilityLeave a Comment on Supreme Court rulings on vicarious liability: Cox and Mohamud