Employment Law: Ingrid Moonrakers Case - Essay Example

As Head Teacher at Farside Comprehensive school Ingrid Moonraker’s, Ingrid is an agent of the local education authority and her conduct as such is deemed to be that of the local education authorities. The liability of the local education authority is founded on principles of vicarious liability. The master/servant or employer/employer relationship between Ingrid and the local authority is such that her employer is responsible for any harm that occurs in the course of her duties.1 Employment for the purposes of vicarious liability refers to the degree of control one has over another. For instance if the individual is accountable to another and is required to act on instructions from another, he or she is an employee.2 On the facts, Ingrid is under the command of the local education authority. Sonja can therefore sue the latter on the basis of vicarious liability. The only means by which the local education authority may escape liability is if they can successfully argue that Ingrid, by letting the Hall was not acting in the course of her employment, but rather, was off on a frolic of her own. However, this will be a difficult argument for the authority to substantiate in light of the court’s ruling in Rose v Plenty .where the court ruled that an employee who performed a prohibited act, was not off on a frolic of his own because he was still acting in the course of employment.3 Vicarious liability is meant to confer a measure of strict liability on the employer so that the employer may not escape liability by distancing himself from the employee who is acting in the usual course of his or her employment.4 It therefore follows, that although Ingrid may have not been authorized to let the Hall, she was nonetheless acting in the course of her employment. In this regard, the local authority is liable for Ingrid’s conduct and the question then turns on whether or not Ingrid’s conduct is such as to give rise to liability in tort. To this end the duty of care toward occupiers of the premises is founded on both common law and statutory principles. The defective equipment, for all intents and purposes will fall within the parameters of local authority’s duty of care with respect to persons on the school’s premises. The local authority delegated the control and care of the premises to Ingrid as head teacher. Ingrid’s control is manifested by her conduct. Occupiers’ liability is a tort which mandates that the occupier of premises owes a duty of care to visitors or trespassers with respect to defective or dangerous premises. Since, Sonja is a visitor to the premises, any claim that she might have in respect of the defective equipment on the premises will fall under the Occupiers Liability Act 1957.5 For the purposes of the 1957 Act, Ingrid is an occupier. An occupier of premises is a person with sufficient degree of control of the premises to be regarded as an occupier.6 Ingrid’s degree of control is manifested by the fact that she is the Head Teacher at the school and two specific incidents. First, Ingrid had the requisite authority and control to close access to Sports Hall G. Secondly, it can be assumed that Ingrid had the authority to rent the Hall out to Who Dares Wins since she had the authority to close the Hall and to authorize the repairs. By virtue of Section 1(2) of the 1957 Act, Sonja, as a participant with Who Dares is a visitor to the Hall.7 A visitor is any person that the occupier grants permission or is taken to have granted permission to use or enter the premises. 8 Sonja as Who Dares’ participant has implied permission to enter the Hall. Section 2(2) sets forth the extent of the duty of care owed an occupier. To this end Ingrid is required to: “...take such care as in all the circumstances of the case is reasonable to see that the visitor will be reasonably safe in using the premises for the purposed for which he is invited or permitted by the occupier to be there.”9 Ingrid knows before hand that the premises are not safe since she had only just notified the school that G Hall is off limits for safety reasons. Notwithstanding this knowledge she lets he place to Who Dares and she did not warn the company of the safety concerns , nor did she take any precautions to safeguard the company against the safety risks. By failing to take these steps, Ingrid is not only negligent pursuant to common law principles of the duty of care, she is also negligent by virtue of her statutory duty under Section 2(2) of the 1957 Act. The standard of care imposed upon Ingrid as the occupier of the premises in no different from the traditional standard of care in the law of tort. The duty of care evolved from Lord Atkins’ neighbour principle in the case of Donoghue v Stevenson. According to Lord Atkins we are each required to take reasonable care to prevent injury to others who are within our contemplation.10 In short, in order for Sonja to succeed in a claim against the local school authority she is required to prove that the defendant owed her a duty of care. The duty of care in this instance is both a statutory and common law duty to ensure Sonja’s safety as a visitor on the premises. Once the duty of care is establised she is required to prove that the defendant breached that duty and that as a result of the breach, the conduct giving rise to the breach of duty caused the Sonja actionable damages. In order to be actionable the damages must be reasonably foreseeable although the foreeseability of the exact type of damages is not necessary.11 In other words, all that is necessary is for it to be foreseeable that some sort of harm was likely if an individual was exposed to the defective premises. Ingrid was a ware of the likely harm to individuals. This is evidenced by the fact that she had closed the premises to staff and students. To start with, damages as a result of faulty equipment which Ingrid was aware of is not a remote possibility. In fact it was a certain possibility as manifested by Ingrid’s insistence that Hall be off limits to the school. The injuries sustained by Sonja is also a direct result of Ingrid’s negligence in that she did not take steps to ensure that visitors were warned of the dangers and defects at the Hall. In all the circumstances, Ingrid’s knowledge of the defective equipment and her failure to take steps to ensure that no injury occurred lends credence to the assumption that the injuries sustaned by Sonja were foreseeable. It is important to note that foreseability of the exact type of injures is not necessary.12 Therefore, irrespective of the type of injuries sustained by Sonja, the local education authorities are likely responsible for Sonja’s injuries, since some injury of the type actually sustained was at least reasonably foreseeable. To this end, letting the defective premises, with foresight of the risk of harm to visitors establishes causation on the part of the local education authorities via their employee Ingrid under the doctrine of vicarious liability. If Ingrid is a child a special duty of care is extended to her under Section 2(3) of the 1957 Act. Section 2(3)(a) provides that occupiers are required to be prepared for children who are not as dilligent as adults. A local authority who planted a poisonous plant in a park, should have fenced it of in the event children happen by.13 It was held in Phipps v Rochester, that an occupier discharges his or her duty of care toward children if precautions are made so that a child accompanied by adult supvision is reasonably safe.14 A mere warning would have been sufficient to at least partly discharge Ingrid and by extension, the local education authorities who are vicarious liable of the duty of care.15 A warning under 1957 Act would have included a specific warning, explaining the nature of the danger and a clearly visible warning.16 Since Ingrid did not take the time to issue a warning of any kind, she canot escape liability on behalf of the local education authorities. Bibliography Donoghue v Stevenson [932] AC 562. Glasgow Corporation v Taylor [1922] 1 AC 44. Lister v Hesley Hall [2001] 2 All ER 769. Occupiers Liability Act 1957. Phipps v Rochester Corporation [1955] 1 QB 450. Rogers, W.V.H.(2002) Winfield and Jolowicz on Tort. 16th Edn. London: Sweet and Maxwell. Rose v Plenty [1976] 1 All ER 97. Wheat v E. Lacon and Co. Ltd. [1966] 1 All ER 582. Yewens v Noakes (1880) 6 QBD 530. Read More