Tort -course of employment PDF

Preview

Summary

This document provides that the employer can only be liable if the employee commits a tort and the tort must be committed in the course of the employee’s employment supported by Morris v CW Martin (1966), Majrowski v Guy’s and St Thomas’s NHS Trust (2006), and Poland v Parr & Sons (1927)....

Description

There must be a tort

The employer can only be liable if the employee commits a tort and the tort must be committed in the course of the employee’s employment. Although negligence is the tort most commonly giving rise to vicarious liability, an employer could also be vicariously liable for an employee’s intentional tort such as theft.

Morris v CW Martin (1966)

The employer was liable when one of its employees stole the plaintiff’s mink coat which she had left to be cleaned.

Poland v Parr & Sons (1927)

The employer was liable in trespass to the person when one of his employees, who reasonably believed that some children were stealing the company’s property, struck and injured one of the children.

Majrowski v Guy’s and St Thomas’s NHS Trust (2006)

the House of Lords ruled that the common law principle of strict liability for another’s wrongs was just as applicable to breaches of statutory obligation. Under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, conduct amounting to harassment of another is an offence giving rise to a civil action.

The Court of Appeal and upheld by the House of Lords, which ruled that where a claim met the ‘close connection’ test, an employer might be vicariously liable for breach of a statutory duty placed solely and personally on the employee for harassment committed in the course of employment.

The tort must be committed in the ‘course of employment’

The definition of ‘course of employment’ is crucial because the general rule is that if an employee committed the tort within the course of his employment the employer is liable; if the employee acted outside the scope of employment the employer is not liable....