Tort Of Negligence Essay

Tort of negligence is the failure to act as a reasonable person to exercise the standard of care required by the law and resulting in damage to the party to whom the duty was owed. To prove negligence, the claimant must show that the defendant causing the damage was not only the actual cause of damage. He also show that the proximate cause of the damage. Proximity is the legal relationship between the parties from which the law will attribute a duty of care. And to prove negligence the type of the damage that occurred must have been foreseeable. Foreseeability means whether a ‘reasonable person’ would have foreseen the damage in the situations. It is the leading test which is used to determine proximate cause. The important point is a duty of care may not be owed to a particular claimant, if a claimant was unforeseeable. Foreseeability and proximate cause will be discussed

This rule was laid down by the Privy Council in the case of Overseas Tankship (UK) Ltd v Mortis Dock & Engineering Co Ltd (The Wagon Mound no 1). In this case the defendants spilled furnace oil from their ship into Sydney harbour and damaged the plaintiff’s wharf. The oil subsequently caused a fire when molten metal dropped into the water and ignited cotton waste floating in the port. The Privy Council held that the defendant is not liable. Because a reasonable man could not possibly have foreseen the wharf would be damaged in this way, as a result of the defendant’s act. It was found that the damage was thus too remote for