From: Robert Stevens <robert.stevens@law.ox.ac.uk>
To: Lee, James <james.lee@kcl.ac.uk>
obligations@uwo.ca
Date: 28/01/2015 11:35:00 UTC
Subject: RE: UK Supreme Court on Police Liability in Negligence
I, of course, think the decision is clearly correct, and that the reasoning of the majority is close to impeccable. It is good to have the true basis for the result in Hill so clearly articulated.

My only criticism relates to something Lady Hale says in dissent [191]

"But what of public authorities? They certainly owe positive duties towards the public as a whole, or towards certain sections of the public, but do they ever owe a duty of care in negligence towards individuals who suffer harm if they fail to perform those duties? The answer given in cases such as Stovin v Wise [1996] AC 923 and Gorringe v Calderdale Metropolitan Borough Page 55 Council [2004] UKHL 15, [2004] 1 WLR 1057, is that generally speaking they do not. However, there are exceptions, and one which I find particularly instructive in this case is that established by the Court of Appeal in D v East Berkshire NHS Trust [2003] EWCA Civ 1151, [2004] QB 558"

D v East Berks is no exception

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2003/1151.htmlhttp://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2003/1151.html

In a number of appeals parents (and in one case a child) claimed damages for psychiatric injury for children being negligently taken into care based on unfounded allegations of abuse. None of them involved a claim by a child (or parent) for the negligent failure to take into care in cases of actual abuse. The court do not discuss liability for nonfeasance, because it did not arise.
R
From: Lee, James [james.lee@kcl.ac.uk]
Sent: 28 January 2015 10:32
To: obligations@uwo.ca
Subject: UK Supreme Court on Police Liability in Negligence

Dear Colleagues,

 

The UK Supreme Court has this morning confirmed the general principle that the police do not owe a duty of care to individual members of the public (broadly, the “Hill” principle, although there is some criticism of elements of Lord Keith’s judgment from the Hill case), and that they did not owe a duty to the particular victim in this case, who was murdered by her former partner. She had called the police after he threatened her, but because of serious failings by two police forces, the police did not arrive as soon as they should have. Her family sought to sue the police in both negligence and under the Human Rights Act 1998.

 

In a 5:2 split, Lord Toulson gives the majority judgment, while Lord Kerr and Lady Hale dissent. The court was unanimous that the claim under the Human Rights Act should be allowed to proceed. The full judgment is here https://www.supremecourt.uk/decided-cases/docs/UKSC_2013_0043_Judgment.pdf. There are specific observations about this area of the law, but both the majority and minority both purport to be proceeding from basic negligence principles. (One might note that, compared to many other cases, the Supreme Court does not engage in the judgments with as much academic literature as they might have).

 

Our students here at King’s are currently working on an essay on this area – to that end, I have quickly gone through the case and picked out what initially appear to be some key passages and put them on some slides – without pretending to be comprehensive, I have attached them in case they might be of some use to members too.

 

Best wishes,

James

 

--

James Lee

Senior Lecturer in Private Law

The Dickson Poon School of Law
King's College London
Strand
London WC2R 2LS

 

E-mail: james.lee@kcl.ac.uk

 

Tel: +44 (0)20 7848 2363

 

Profile: http://www.kcl.ac.uk/law/people/academic/j-lee.aspx