According to common law, “negligence is defined as a conduct that fall below the standard of care necessary to protect other from unreasonable risk of injury”. The legal issue is whether […….] can successfully sue […….] for negligence. In order to know whether the defendant commit negligence or not, 4 elements must be satisfied, including 1) Duty of care (DoC), 2) Breach of the DoC, 3) Causation and 4) Remoteness.
1) DUTY OF CARE
Case 1: PHYSICAL INJURY: The first element to be proven is whether D owed P a DOC by….
R: To prove that D owes a DOC to P, the P must show that at the time of D’s careless action, it was RF that harm to person like P could result.
A: Here, when D carelessly to do (…), it was RF that harm to P could result b/c…
Additionally, to know whether […….] owed […….] a DoC for physical injury, we apply Lord Atkin’s Neighbour test, we owe a DoC to our neighbours who are closely and directly affected by our act. According to Donoghue vs Stevenson,P is the neighbour of D since P is other drivers on the street/ passengers on the D property/ pedestrians/ owners of property next to the street (Australian Safeway Stores v. Zaluzna), …. Therefore,P is the type that D should RF might be injured by his/her carelessness in D’s action C: Therefore, D owed/ didn’t owe P a DoC for physical injury.
RECOGNISE DoC: Drivers – other drivers, passengers, pedestrians, owners of buildings next to the street; Manufacturers – customers (Donoghue v. Stevenson); Owners/occupiers of property (Australian Safeway Stores v. Zaluzna) – people entering their property; professionals – clients.
IF there is 3 rd party >> Failure TO ACT to prevent harm (2 factors): R: No DoC unless it is RF that the D’s failure to act could cause harm to someone like the P and either (a) The parties are in a relationship of reliance and dependence (teacher, doctor, prisoner, employer) OR (b) The defendant has control over the person or property causing the harm