First Principles of Business Law

12. Negligence

12 (b) The essential elements of liability in Negligence

The concept of Negligence is broad enough to cover many different situations in which one person's conduct causes harm to another. In fact, Negligence is potentially such a wide concept that limits have had to be imposed on its application. These limits are contained in the essential requirements or 'elements' that must be proved to exist for liability in Negligence to be recognised.

These requirements are that, in the circumstances of the case:

• The defendant owed the plaintiff a duty of care

• The the defendant breached their duty of care by being careless

• As the result of the defendant’s breach, the plaintiff suffered a loss or injury that was reasonably foreseeable.

Each of these elements is explained in more detail in the sections that follow.