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The employer's duty to their employees is personal and non-delegable. They can
delegate the performance of the duty to others, whether employees or independent
contractors, but not responsibility for its negligent performance:
Wilsons & Clyde Coal v English [1937]
Competent Staff: The employer has an obligation to select competent fellow employees,
and a correlative duty to give them proper instruction in the use of equipment.
Harrison v Michelin Tyre Co [1985]
If an employer knows or can foresee that acts being done by employees might cause
physical or psychiatric harm to a fellow employee, it is arguable that the employer could
be in breach of duty to that employee if he did nothing to prevent those acts when it was
in his power to do so.
Waters v MPC (2000)
Safe Place of Work: An employer must take such steps as are reasonable to see that the
premises are safe.
Wilson v Tyneside Window Cleaning Co [1958]
Cook v Square D Ltd [1992]
Adequate Plant and Equipment: An employer has a 'duty of taking reasonable care to
provide proper appliances, and to maintain them in a proper condition' (per Lord
Herschell , Smith v Baker [1891]. If necessary equipment is unavailable and this leads to
an accident he will be liable, although he is not necessarily bound to adopt the latest
improvements and equipment (Toronto Power Co v Paskwan [1915]
If the employee would not have used the safety equipment if it had been supplied the
employer's breach of duty is not the cause of injury (McWilliams v Sir William Arrol &
Co [1962].
Section 1(1) of the Employers' Liability (Defective Equipment) Act 1969 (which
reversed the decision of the House of Lords in Davie v New Merton Board Mills [1959]
makes an employer liable if an employee suffers personal injury in the course of his
employment in consequence of a defect in equipment provided by the employer, and the
defect is attributable wholly or partly to the fault of a third party, whether identifiable
or not.
An employer will not be liable if a worker fails to make proper use of the equipment
supplied, nor where the employee acted foolishly in choosing the wrong tool for the job,
