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Robert Addie & Sons (Collieries) Ltd. v. Dumbreck ((1929) A.C.
358)
The condition of liability was stated to be some wilful act
involving something more than the absence of reasonable care - some
act done with the deliberate intention of doing harm to the
trespasser, or at least some act done with reckless disregard of the
presence of the trespasser.
Notes
To illustrate binding precedent within the tort of negligence,
remembering how the common law often reflects social change,
consider Addie v Dumbreck Collieries whereby a precedent regarding
injury to a child trespasser was bound under stare decisis for 43
years. Although the decision was originally considered fair,
Society’s viewpoint of children changed, forcing the judiciary to
apply extra-ordinary measures to work around this binding precedent
and allow ‘fairness’ within a changing socio-political climate.
In British
Railways Board v Herrington the HL recognised that society
considered children in a different light to 1929 and that the
existing precedent stood against the “common humanity” owed by an
occupier to a trespasser, illustrating how the judiciary although
controlled by binding precedent saw fit to develop the law in light
of current social thought.
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