Essay On Vicarious Liability

VICARIOUS LIABILITY

The tort doctrine that imposes responsibility upon one person for the failure of another, with whom the person has a special relationship (such as Parent and Child, Employer and Employee. Or Owner of vehicle and Driver), to exercise such care as a reasonably prudent person would use under similar circumstances.

Vicarious Liability is a legal doctrine that assigns liability for an injury to a person who did not cause the injury but who has a particular legal relationship to the person who did act negligently. It is also referred to as imputed Negligence. Legal relationships that can lead to imputed negligence include the relationship between Parent and Child, Husband and Wife, Owner of a vehicle and Driver, and Employer and Employee. Ordinarily the independent negligence of one person is not imputable to another person.

Other theories of liability that are premised on imputed negligence include the Respondeat Superior doctrine and the family car doctrine.

The

He proceeded on his journey but instead of taking firm’s lorry, he used his father’s car and whilst driving negligently collided with and killed the plantiff’s husband. The workman has used a private car for the purpose of the defendant’s business on other occasion and had never been told not to use a private car for those purposes. The plantiff contended that the workman was acting acting within the scope of his authority and within the course of employment and hence the defendants were held liable for damages. The defendants contended that by taking a private car instead of a lorry, which he was instructed to take, the workman had changed the journey from authorized to an unauthorized journey. It was held that the workman was doing an authorized act within the scope of his employment and although it was done in an unauthorized way, it was not done in a prohibited way and the defendants were