Civil and Criminal law aspects Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Civil and Criminal law aspects - Essay Example Taylor. The accident happened under her supervision and this raises serious issues. The duty of care arises from the teacher-pupil relationship. Being a teacher, Mrs. Taylor had to comply with the School Teachers’ Pay and Condition Document. This Act, among other matters, charges teachers with a duty of care versus pupils, which extends to â€Å"maintaining good order and discipline and safeguarding their pupils’ health and safety, both when they are on school premises and engaged in authorized school activities elsewhere.†1 This means that when at school or in any other place engaged in a school activity, the teachers owe a duty of care to their pupils, just as Mrs. Taylor owed Chloe a duty of care. However, whether Mrs. Chloe, as an individual teacher, may be found guilty of negligence depends on whether Chloe’s accident may have been reasonably foreseen. Although the concept of medical malpractice has been widely used over the past years, the English Co urts prefer to apply it mostly to cases involving children with certain disabilities. That is why the concept of negligence is more appropriate in this case. Steele J. (2007, p.110) states that â€Å"In order to succeed in a claim in negligence, the claimant must show that the following criteria are met: 1. The defendant owes the claimant a duty of care†2 The existence of a duty of care owed by Mrs. Taylor to Chloe has already been justified above. Moreover, according to Kelly, E.B. (1998, page 32), â€Å"School teachers and administrators have a duty to provide a safe environment and to protect students from unreasonable risk of harm.†3 Although a teacher’s duty of care is not directly stipulated by law, its existence has been upheld in the English courts as a duty which derives from common use laws and case law. 2. â€Å"The duty has been breached†4 Mrs. Taylor breached her duty of care by allowing Chloe, a very young 10-year-old girl to try to perform the difficult exercise. Moreover, in spite of her allowing it, she did not supervise Chloe attentively enough to prevent her from injuring herself, although Mrs. Taylor was standing close to her. 3. â€Å"The defendant’s breach of duty has caused the claimant to suffer loss or damage of a relevant sort†5 If Mrs. Chloe had acted with proper care , Chloe would not have been injured as a result of the unfortunate accident, because it would have not happened at all. 4. â€Å"That damage is caused in law by the defendant’s negligence/is not too remote/is within the scope of his duty.†6 Taking care of the pupils under her supervision is one of the most important duties of a teacher, including Mrs. Taylor. We should also draw attention to the neighbour principal, stated by Lord Atkin in Donoghue v Stevenson (1932): â€Å"The rule that you are to love your neighbour becomes in law, you must not injure your neighbour; and the lawyer’s question ‘Who i s my neighbour?’ receives a restricted reply. You must take reasonable care to avoid acts or omissions which you can reasonably foresee would be likely to injure your neighbour. Who, then, in law is my neighbour? The answer seems to be – persons who are so closely and directly affected by my act that I ought reasonably to have them in contemplation as being so affected when I am directing my mind to the acts or omissions which are called in question.†7 I would also apply the statement made by Lord Rodger in the case of Home