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The Defendant's Placed Sawdust But Did Not Close The Factory, A Step That The ...

The defendant's placed sawdust but did not close the factory, a step that the claimant maintained they should have taken. The House of Lords ruled that the degree of risk had to be weighed against the extent of remedial work that was necessary. In this case it would not have been reasonable to require them to shut down the entire factory.
The most tenuous of the factors was considered in Watt v Hertfordshire County Council [1954] 1 WLR 835 where an accident occurred during an emergency services operation to douse a fire. The Court of Appeal ruled that the risk that had been taken must be weighed against the social utility of the activity. In this case the nature of the enterprise was sufficient to shield the Council from an allegation that they had breached their duties to the employee in negligence.
This balancing test is the first of two critical issues that involve the ‘breach' question. The second is the perspective from which the actions must be drawn. This is a crucial point because between that which the claimant states could be done and what the defendant believed could be done there is likely to be a not insignificant chasm.
The crucial authority is Roe v Minister of Health [1954] 2 QB 66. In this case Denning LJ wrote that the crucial date of knowledge was the date of the incident. The defendant could not be held liable simply because the case was determined at a later date when there existed a different accepted belief or a more modern understanding. Likewise the duty will only have been breached if the defendant fails in his or her duties and this test is assessed under an objective standard of care.
Further it has been held that an inability to meet the objective standards of reasonableness does not provide a defence in law. In Nettleship v Weston [1971] 2 QB 691 a driver taking unofficial lessons was clearly incapable at the time of the accident of meeting the burdens of a reasonable driver. Nonetheless she was held to be liable for an accident because she did not meet those standards.
At the other end of the spectrum are those who have certain special skills. The pertinent authority is Maynard v Midlands Regional Health Authority [1984] 1 WLR 634 where the medical practitioner was accused of negligence. The court ruled that he had fulfilled his duty up to the point of an ordinary reasonable practitioner but that he had no satisfied the level of skill that would be expected of a specialist of his experience. As such a finding of negligence was appropriate.
The final island in the uncertain ocean of ‘breach' law is the specific question of whether it is sufficient for a defendant to argue that the course of action that he took was justified by a core of that particular discipline. This is most regularly tested in the sphere of medical law with the ever-changing opinions causing difficulties for the judiciary.

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