Omission of Duties

Delivering the majority judgment, Lord Atkin laid down the rule of determining the duty thus: "The liability for negligence is no doubt based upon a general public sentiment of moral wrong doing for which the offender must pay.



But acts or omissions which any moral code would censure cannot in a practical world be treated so as to give a right to every person injured by them to demand relief."



In this way rules of law arise which limit the range of complaints and the extent of their remedy. The rule that you are to love your neighbor becomes, in law, you must not injure your neighbor; and the lawyer’s question, "who is my neighbor?" receives a restricted reply.



You must take reasonable care to avoid acts or omission which can reasonably foresee would be likely to injure your neighbor. Who, then, in law is my neighbor? The answer seems to be persons who are so closely and directly affected by my act that I ought reasonably to have them in contemplation as being so affected when I am directing my mind to the act or omission which are called in question."



Lord Atkin after laying down the principle of notional duty, stated that under what circumstances a manufacturer owes a duty of care towards the consumer in following words: " a manufacturer of products, which he sells in such a form as to show that he intends them to reach the ultimate consumer in the form in which they left him with no reasonable possibility of intermediate examination, and with the knowledge that the absence of reasonable care in the preparation or pitting up of the products will result in an injury to the consumer’s life or property, owes a duty to the consumer to take that reasonable care".



The House of Lords laid down, in the course of the decision, the general test for deciding whether a duty to take care exists.





The Author "Micheal Robb" is an expert Legal adviser who owns and runs a site on Law,Rules and Regulations:

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