Law of Torts and Consumer Protection

Tort: nature and general principles

A tort is a civil wrong, independent of contract, for which the law provides a remedy, usually compensation. Unlike crime, its primary aim is not punishment but restoration: putting the injured party, as far as money can, in the position that would have existed without the wrong. Unlike contract, its duties are owed generally to persons who may be affected, not only to a bargaining partner. The maxim that where there is a right there is a remedy captures the idea that recognised interests — bodily safety, property, reputation, and in limited cases pure economic interests — are protected, while the principle that damage without legal wrong gives no claim captures its limit: loss alone, without breach of a legal duty, is not compensable. Tort therefore balances freedom of action against protection from harm, and its doctrines constantly ask whether the defendant owed a duty, whether that duty was breached, whether breach caused the loss, and whether the loss is legally recoverable.

Negligence is the most important modern tort and the template for general principles. Duty of care asks whether the defendant stood in a relationship of proximity to the claimant such that harm was reasonably foreseeable and it is fair, just, and reasonable to impose a duty. The neighbour principle — care toward persons so closely and directly affected that they ought reasonably to be in contemplation — remains the starting point, refined by policy considerations about floodgates, conflicting duties, and the role of public bodies. Breach is judged by the standard of a reasonable person in the defendant's position, considering probability and severity of harm, cost of precautions, and social utility of the activity; professionals are judged by the standard of a reasonably competent professional. Causation has two parts: factual causation, tested by whether harm would have occurred but for the breach, and legal causation, which asks whether the breach is a legally sufficient cause despite intervening events. Damage must be recognised by law: physical injury and property damage are core, while psychiatric harm and pure economic loss are recovered only within narrower, policy-sensitive limits. Defences include consent, where a person voluntarily accepts a known risk, contributory negligence, which reduces recovery where the claimant's own fault contributed, illegality in limited cases, and statutory authority where legislation authorises the act. Vicarious liability, introduced in jurisprudence, reappears here as the mechanism by which employers answer for employees acting in the course of employment.

Specific torts and remoteness

Trespass protects possession and bodily integrity against direct, intentional interference: trespass to land is entry without permission, trespass to the person includes assault as apprehension of immediate unlawful force, battery as intentional application of force, and false imprisonment as total restraint without lawful justification. Nuisance protects use and enjoyment of land: private nuisance is unreasonable interference, judged by duration, intensity, locality, and the claimant's sensitivity, while public nuisance affects the public at large and gives a private action only where special damage is suffered beyond the general public. Defamation protects reputation against false statements published to a third party that lower the claimant in the estimation of right-thinking people, with defences of truth, fair comment on matters of public interest, and privilege for statements made in protected contexts such as parliamentary and judicial proceedings. Economic torts protect business interests against wrongful interference, including inducing breach of contract and intimidation, but they are kept narrow to avoid chilling legitimate competition.

Remoteness limits liability to consequences that are not too far removed from the wrong. The test is foreseeability of the type of harm, not its precise extent or manner: a defendant who foreseeably risks one type of physical injury is liable for that type even if the injury proves more severe than expected, while a wholly unforeseeable type of harm is too remote. The eggshell-skull rule qualifies this: a defendant takes the victim as found, so unforeseeable vulnerability that aggravates a foreseeable type of harm does not break liability. Intervening acts may break the chain of causation where they are independent, voluntary, and unforeseeable, such as a deliberate act by a third party or an extraordinary natural event, but foreseeable medical treatment, rescue attempts, and ordinary responses to danger do not break the chain. Contributory negligence and consent interact with remoteness: a claimant who unreasonably exposes themselves to a known risk may see damages reduced or, in consent cases, defeated, while a defendant cannot escape liability merely because harm could have been avoided by extraordinary care on the claimant's part. Examination answers should separate factual causation, legal causation, and remoteness, because merging them produces the common error of treating any distant consequence as either always recoverable or never recoverable.

Strict, absolute and State liability

Fault is the ordinary basis of tort, but some activities are so hazardous, or some policy reasons so strong, that liability is imposed without proof of negligence. Strict liability applies where a person brings onto land and keeps there something likely to cause mischief if it escapes, and it does escape and cause damage, subject to defences such as act of a stranger, act of God, plaintiff's own default, and statutory authority. Its rationale is risk allocation: the person who creates an extraordinary risk and benefits from it should bear the cost when the risk materialises, rather than neighbours who did not choose it. Absolute liability goes further: for inherently hazardous industries and activities, liability is imposed without the exceptions available under strict liability, and compensation is tied to the magnitude and capacity of the enterprise, reflecting the idea that enterprises engaged in hazardous activity for profit must fully internalise its costs. The distinction matters in examinations: strict liability admits defined defences and is tied to escape from land, while absolute liability admits essentially no such defences and is grounded in hazardous enterprise.

State liability asks when public bodies answer in tort. The state may be liable for acts of its servants in the same way as an employer, where the act is done in the course of employment and is not protected by sovereign immunity. The sovereign-function exception has narrowed over time: acts that only the state can perform as sovereign, such as defence and core policymaking, are treated differently from ordinary commercial, custodial, and service functions, where liability follows ordinary principles. Constitutional remedies add a parallel track: where state action violates fundamental rights, compensation may be awarded through constitutional proceedings even where ordinary tort remedies are difficult, reflecting the state's special duty to protect rights. Public authorities also owe duties of care in exercising statutory powers, but courts are cautious about imposing duties that would distort discretion, create indeterminate liability, or conflict with statutory schemes. The balance is between accountability and governability: the state must answer for careless custodial, medical, and infrastructural failures, without becoming an insurer for every policy disappointment.

Consumer, motor vehicles and competition law

Consumer law protects buyers and users of goods and services against defects, deficiencies, unfair trade practices, and misleading claims. A consumer is a person who buys goods or hires services for personal use, not for resale or commercial purpose in the narrow sense, and the regime provides tiered forums at district, state, and national levels, with pecuniary jurisdiction, appeal routes, and powers to order removal of defects, replacement, refund, compensation, and corrective action. Unfair trade practice includes false claims about quality, quantity, standard, or sponsorship, misleading price representations, and deceptive packaging, while restrictive trade practice concerns practices that manipulate prices or conditions of supply to impose unjustified costs. Product liability extends responsibility to manufacturers, service providers, and sellers in defined circumstances for harm caused by defective products, shifting the burden that tort alone placed on consumers to prove negligence against distant producers. The consumer regime is deliberately accessible: simplified procedure, limited fees, and an emphasis on speedy redress distinguish it from ordinary civil litigation.

Motor vehicle law provides a specialised compensation regime for road accidents, recognising that fault-based tort alone leaves many victims uncompensated after hit-and-run, uninsured, or insolvent drivers. It requires compulsory insurance, provides no-fault compensation in defined fatal and injury cases, and channels claims through tribunals that assess negligence, contributory fault, and quantum — including loss of income, medical expenses, loss of consortium, and future prospects — on a structured basis. Competition law protects the market itself: it prohibits anti-competitive agreements that fix prices, limit production, share markets, or rig bids, prohibits abuse of a dominant position through predatory pricing, denial of market access, or discriminatory conditions, and regulates combinations that may substantially lessen competition. Its regulator investigates, orders cessation, imposes penalties, and may direct structural remedies, while parties can appeal to specialised appellate forums. Together these regimes show tort's modern evolution: from bilateral fault between strangers toward institutional protection of consumers, road users, and competitive markets, where compensation, deterrence, and access are pursued through forums designed for the purpose.

Negligence elements and defences

Strict versus absolute liability