Tort Law Research Paper

This paper gives a short introduction of tort law and mainly focus on the standard of care, how the courts determining what is the ‘reasonable person’ and whether there are some exceptions to the courts. The law of tort is the law of civil liability for wrongfully injury which provides remedies to individuals harmed by the wrongful conduct of others in order to protect an individual’s private rights. There are two major categories of torts: intentional tort and negligent tort. The general principle of negligence is concerned with compensating people who have injured or damaged and thus a defendant will be negligent if he or she falling below the standard of the ordinary reasonable man in the same situation. A person will be liable for their …show more content…
The courts will use an objective test that is ‘what the reasonable person would do in the same situation?’ which means the court will consider about what is the behaviour of another ‘reasonable man’ will exercise when he/she face in the same circumstance rather then the defendant. Baron Alderson gave a classic statement of the definition of negligence which expound how to define a ‘reasonable man’, it demonstrated that the standard of a person’s conduct should be attained is that of the reasonable man. Put in a simple way, as an objective test which is impossible for the court take into consideration about the characteristics and/or capabilities of the defendant, for example, a learner driver may be doing her best to avoid driving accident but his incapability to meet the standard is irrelevant. Moreover, Lord Macmillan said the personal idiosyncrasies of the particular person is eliminated. The objective standard of care would seem to be a little harsh sometimes but it can be understood that the law is trying to be strike and ensure the claimant will be …show more content…
Therefore the courts choose to lower the standard of care when the defendant in a rescue situation. However, the nature of the emergency services does not have special exemption from negligence. In addiction, the standard of care usually lower when considering about sporting injury because participants are forcing on triumph and thus some risks are acceptable and justified.

Moreover, the court will also consider the probability of the injury occurring thus the less probability of the injury occurring the lower standard of care required. In other words, the more likely or foreseeable damage or injury will occur, the courts more likely to find that the defendants liability for failing. A person should always be reasonable to take steps to avoid risks even that is a small risks. Therefore, the person will not be negligent if he/she has take steps to avoid the risks, or the risks which a reasonable person would not