Pearson Commission

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The Royal Commission on Civil Liability and Compensation for Personal Injury, better known as the Pearson commission was a United Kingdom royal commission, established in 1973 under the chairmanship of Lord Pearson. The commission reported in 1978 and made radical recommendations for tort reform, Pearson believing that tort's traditional role of compensation had become outdated with the rise of the welfare state since the end of World War II. He saw the benefits system as having the primary role of providing compensation and security following an accident, and litigation as being secondary. As a result, the commission recommended a no-fault insurance scheme for road traffic and industrial accidents, similar to the subsequent New Zealand Accident Compensation Corporation, and a scheme of strict liability for consumer protection. However, the government's response was cool and the recommendations were not followed up, much to Pearson's disappointment. [1]

Contents

Terms of reference

The commission's terms of reference were: [1]

To consider to what extent, in what circumstances and by what means compensation should be payable in respect of death or personal injury (including ante-natal injury) suffered by any person in the course of employment; through the use of a motor vehicle or other form of transport; through the manufacture, supply or use of goods or services; on premises belonging to or occupied by another or otherwise through the act or omission of another where compensation under the present law is recoverable only on proof of fault or under the rules of strict liability, having regard to the cost and other implications of the arrangements for the recovery of compensation, whether by way of compulsory insurance or otherwise.

Members

The commission's members were: [1]

Recommendations

Recovery of damages in tort - no profound changes were recommended but deduction from damages for social security benefits received was recommended and this was subsequently implemented. There was a further recommendation for the introduction of structured settlements but this was not implemented until 1 April 2005 and without the inflation-proofing that the commission had recommended. [2] [3]

Work injuries - a no-fault insurance scheme administered by the Department of Health and Social Security (DHSS), financed by employers and providing benefits at the level of the State Earnings-Related Pension Scheme. The scheme was also proposed to extend to the self-employed and injuries incurred during commuting.

Road injuries - a no-fault insurance scheme administered by the DHSS, financed by a levy on petrol, estimated at 1p per gallon (0.8p per litre at 2003 prices [4] )

Air transport, Sea and inland waterways - the commission noted that this was largely constrained by international conventions such as the Warsaw Convention but regretted the low level of settlements allowed.

Rail transport - a no-fault scheme was rejected in favour of proposed strict liability for accidents arising from movement of rolling stock.

Products liability - a no-fault scheme was rejected and the strict liability scheme drafted by the Council of Europe and the Commission of the European Union favoured. These European initiatives ultimately led to European Community Directive 85/374/EEC and the Consumer Protection Act 1987. [5]

Services in general - retention of existing remedies for the tort of negligence.

Medical injuries - a no-fault scheme was not recommended but the commission held that the New Zealand and Sweden experience should be studied and reviewed. Strict liability for injury to human volunteers in clinical trials was recommended. No such strict liability was introduced and subsequent volunteers often faced complex litigation as following the disastrous TGN1412 trial in 2006.

Children - The commission proposed a general benefit for severely disabled children, no matter how their disability was caused, to be financed from general taxation.

Vaccine damage - The commission proposed that this would be compensated by the general benefit for severely disabled children. Where vaccination took place on the recommendation of the government, strict liability was proposed.

Ante-natal injury - The commission proposed that this would be compensated by the general benefit for severely disabled children and by strict liability such as it applied to pharmaceuticals. The provisions of the Congenital Disabilities (Civil Liability) Act 1976 should be restricted as it affected family members.

Occupiers' liability - no change to law on occupiers' liability save the introduction of the Law Commissions recommendations on liability to trespassers which ultimately led to the Occupiers' Liability Act 1984.

Criminal injuries - activities of Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority endorsed and to be reviewed in the light of proposals for civil liability.

Animals - no change save for aligning Scottish law with that of England and Wales and Northern Ireland.

Exceptional risks - strict liability on "controllers of things or operations that by their unusually hazardous nature require supervision because of their potential for causing death or personal injury."

Reception

The Labour government expressed some caution over the recommendations, especially those as to no-fault compensation. [6] The Conservative Party and insurance industry were hostile. [7] [8] The Conservative Party came to power in the 1979 United Kingdom general election and by 1983, the no-fault proposals, though not explicitly rejected, were falling into neglect. [9]

Related Research Articles

Product liability is the area of law in which manufacturers, distributors, suppliers, retailers, and others who make products available to the public are held responsible for the injuries those products cause. Although the word "product" has broad connotations, product liability as an area of law is traditionally limited to products in the form of tangible personal property.

A tort is a civil wrong that causes a claimant to suffer loss or harm, resulting in legal liability for the person who commits the tortious act. Tort law can be contrasted with criminal law, which deals with criminal wrongs that are punishable by the state. While criminal law aims to punish individuals who commit crimes, tort law aims to compensate individuals who suffer harm as a result of the actions of others. Some wrongful acts, such as assault and battery, can result in both a civil lawsuit and a criminal prosecution in countries where the civil and criminal legal systems are separate. Tort law may also be contrasted with contract law, which provides civil remedies after breach of a duty that arises from a contract. Obligations in both tort and criminal law are more fundamental and are imposed regardless of whether the parties have a contract.

In criminal and civil law, strict liability is a standard of liability under which a person is legally responsible for the consequences flowing from an activity even in the absence of fault or criminal intent on the part of the defendant.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Workers' compensation</span> Form of insurance

Workers' compensation or workers' comp is a form of insurance providing wage replacement and medical benefits to employees injured in the course of employment in exchange for mandatory relinquishment of the employee's right to sue his or her employer for the tort of negligence. The trade-off between assured, limited coverage and lack of recourse outside the worker compensation system is known as "the compensation bargain.” One of the problems that the compensation bargain solved is the problem of employers becoming insolvent as a result of high damage awards. The system of collective liability was created to prevent that and thus to ensure security of compensation to the workers.

In its broadest sense, no-fault insurance is any type of insurance contract under which the insured party is indemnified by their own insurance company for losses, regardless of the source of the cause of loss. In this sense, it is similar to first-party coverage. The term "no-fault" is most commonly used in the United States, Australia, and Canada when referring to state or provincial automobile insurance laws where a policyholder and their passengers are reimbursed by the policyholder's own insurance company without proof of fault, and are restricted in their right to seek recovery through the civil-justice system for losses caused by other parties. No-fault insurance has the goal of lowering premium costs by avoiding expensive litigation over the causes of the collision, while providing quick payments for injuries or loss of property.

Liability insurance is a part of the general insurance system of risk financing to protect the purchaser from the risks of liabilities imposed by lawsuits and similar claims and protects the insured if the purchaser is sued for claims that come within the coverage of the insurance policy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">English tort law</span> Branch of English law concerning civil wrongs

English tort law concerns the compensation for harm to people's rights to health and safety, a clean environment, property, their economic interests, or their reputations. A "tort" is a wrong in civil law, rather than criminal law, that usually requires a payment of money to make up for damage that is caused. Alongside contracts and unjust enrichment, tort law is usually seen as forming one of the three main pillars of the law of obligations.

Where two or more persons are liable in respect of the same liability, in most common law legal systems they may either be:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Personal injury</span> Legal term for an injury to a person

Personal injury is a legal term for an injury to the body, mind, or emotions, as opposed to an injury to property. In common law jurisdictions the term is most commonly used to refer to a type of tort lawsuit in which the person bringing the suit has suffered harm to their body or mind. Personal injury lawsuits are filed against the person or entity that caused the harm through negligence, gross negligence, reckless conduct, or intentional misconduct, and in some cases on the basis of strict liability. Different jurisdictions describe the damages in different ways, but damages typically include the injured person's medical bills, pain and suffering, and diminished quality of life.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Non-economic damages caps</span> Limitations in lawsuits

Non-economic damages caps are tort reforms to limit damages in lawsuits for subjective, non-pecuniary harms such as pain, suffering, inconvenience, emotional distress, loss of society and companionship, loss of consortium, and loss of enjoyment of life. This is opposed to economic damages, which encompasses pecuniary harms such as medical bills, lost wages, lost future income, loss of use of property, costs of repair or replacement, the economic value of domestic services, and loss of employment or business opportunities. Non-economic damages should not be confused with punitive or exemplary damages, which are awarded purely to penalise defendants and do not aim to compensate either pecuniary or non-pecuniary losses.

Comparative responsibility is a doctrine of tort law that compares the fault of each party in a lawsuit for a single injury. Comparative responsibility may apply to intentional torts as well as negligence and encompasses the doctrine of comparative negligence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Canadian tort law</span> Aspect of Canadian law

Canadian tort law is composed of two parallel systems: a common law framework outside Québec and a civil law framework within Québec. Outside Québec, Canadian tort law originally derives from that of England and Wales but has developed distinctly since Canadian Confederation in 1867 and has been influenced by jurisprudence in other common law jurisdictions. Meanwhile, while private law as a whole in Québec was originally derived from that which existed in France at the time of Québec's annexation into the British Empire, it was overhauled and codified first in the Civil Code of Lower Canada and later in the current Civil Code of Quebec, which codifies most elements of tort law as part of its provisions on the broader law of obligations. As most aspects of tort law in Canada are the subject of provincial jurisdiction under the Canadian Constitution, tort law varies even between the country's common law provinces and territories.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tort reform</span> Legal reforms aimed at reducing tort litigation

Tort reform consists of changes in the civil justice system in common law countries that aim to reduce the ability of plaintiffs to bring tort litigation or to reduce damages they can receive. Such changes are generally justified under the grounds that litigation is an inefficient means to compensate plaintiffs; that tort law permits frivolous or otherwise undesirable litigation to crowd the court system; or that the fear of litigation can serve to curtail innovation, raise the cost of consumer goods or insurance premiums for suppliers of services, and increase legal costs for businesses. Tort reform has primarily been prominent in common law jurisdictions, where criticism of judge-made rules regarding tort actions manifests in calls for statutory reform by the legislature.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Colin Pearson, Baron Pearson</span> Canadian-born English barrister & judge

Colin Hargreaves Pearson, Baron Pearson, was a Canadian-born English barrister and judge. Rising to sit as a judge in the House of Lords, he is best remembered for his unspectacular but efficient and courteous chairmanship of industrial inquiries and royal commissions. His 1978 report into civil liability and compensation for personal injury made proposals for state pensions for accident victims that were largely rejected by government at the time.

The following outline is provided as an overview of and introduction to tort law in common law jurisdictions:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Product Liability Directive 1985</span> European Union Directive (EU) 1985/374

The Product Liability Directive85/374/EEC is a directive of the Council of the European Communities which created a regime of strict liability for defective products applicable in all member states of the European Union, the other EEA members and the United Kingdom.

Atiyah's Accidents, Compensation and the Law (2006) is a legal text, which marked the first of Cambridge University Press's "Law in Context" series. It was originally authored by English legal scholar, Patrick Atiyah in 1970 and has been taken over by Professor Peter Cane since the 4th edition in 1987. The thrust of the book is that the law of tort should be abolished, especially as relates to the law on personal injuries, and should be replaced with a no fault state compensation system. Its arguments are in tune with the establishment in the 1970s of such a system in New Zealand, with the Accident Compensation Commission.

Increases in the use of autonomous car technologies are causing incremental shifts in the responsibility of driving, with the primary motivation of reducing the frequency of traffic collisions. Liability for incidents involving self-driving cars is a developing area of law and policy that will determine who is liable when a car causes physical damage to persons or property. As autonomous cars shift the responsibility of driving from humans to autonomous car technology, there is a need for existing liability laws to evolve to reasonably identify the appropriate remedies for damage and injury. As higher levels of autonomy are commercially introduced, the insurance industry stands to see higher proportions of commercial and product liability lines, while personal automobile insurance shrinks.

The civil liability of a recreational diver may include a duty of care to another diver during a dive. Breach of this duty that is a proximate cause of injury or loss to the other diver may lead to civil litigation for damages in compensation for the injury or loss suffered.

The first Tort Law in China wasn't enacted until 2009, though ideas similar concepts about social obligations and duties can be found in Confucianism upon which Ancient Chinese law was based.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Berlins (1978)
  2. ↑ Damages Act 1996, s.2
  3. ↑ Dow, D. & Lill, J. (2007). Personal Injury and Clinical Negligence Litigation. London: CLP. pp. pp281–282. ISBN   978-1-905391-28-8.
  4. ↑ O‘Donoghue, J.; et al. (2004). "Consumer Price Inflation since 1750". Economic Trends. 604: 38–46, March.
  5. ↑ Giliker, P. & Beckwith, S. (2004). Tort (2nd ed.). London: Sweet & Maxwell. pp. 9–014 - 9–038. ISBN   0-421-85980-6.
  6. ↑ Berlins, M. (17 March 1978). "Government caution on injuries plan". The Times. p. 1, col.E.
  7. ↑ "Civil liability and compensation proposals could be costly". The Times. 17 March 1978. p. 16, col.C.
  8. ↑ Allen, R. (18 March 1978). "Insurance Counting the cost of Pearson". The Times. p. 1p, col.A.
  9. ↑ "The Pearson Commission: Recommendations, 29 November 1983". Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) . 29 November 1983. Retrieved 18 April 2008.

Bibliography

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