Tort Law

Remoteness cases

Re Polemis [1921] 3 KB 560

Key Point

• If a reasonable man would have foreseen any damage as likely to result from his act, then he is liable for the direct consequences of it suffered by the claimant, whether a reasonable man would have foreseen it or not
• This has now be overruled (see commentary)

Facts

• A chartered vessel was unloading in Casablanca when stevedores (dock workers hired by the charterers) negligently let a plank drop into the hold
• Benzine cans leaked, causing a fire that destroyed the ship
• The shipowners sued the charterers for the loss of the ship

Held (Court of Appeal)

• The charterers where liable for the fire, including all the direct consequence of the negligence, so long as some form of damage could be reasonably foreseen, even though the fire itself could not have reasonably been anticipated

Scrutton LJ

• Damage is indirect if it is ‘due to the operation of independent causes having no connection with the negligent act, except that they could not avoid its results’

Commentary

• The direct consequences test was overruled in The Wagon Mound (No 1), where it was held that the actual injury caused by the defendant’s negligence must be reasonably foreseeable to be claimed as damages