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reasonably practicable, a safe means of access to the place at which the plaintiff had to
work, i.e., to take out the nails, and that this also was a cause of his injury.
(3)
on a claim under s6 (2) of the Law Reform (Married Women and Tortfeasors) Act
1935,
for contribution made by the occupiers, liable under the Factories Act 1937,
against the sub-contractors, liable at common law, that, since the occupiers had
employed contractors to do the work leaving the method and manner of it entirely to
the sub-contractors, all proper precautions were the province of the sub-contractors
and the responsibility for the injury was that of the sub-contractors. Accordingly the
contribution to be recovered by the occupiers should amount to a complete indemnity.
Summers (John) & Sons v Frost [1955] – nature of ‘absolute duty’
Sutherland v Hatton and others [2002] – reasonableness in relation to harm from
stress at work
Absolute Duty
The plaintiff was grinding a piece of metal on a grinding machine and was injured when
his thumb came into contact with the grinding wheel. The upper part of the machine
was guarded, but the grinding wheel itself was not.
It was held that the employers were liable for a breach of section 14 (1) of the Factories
Act. That required that the dangerous part ‘shall be securely fenced’ was absolute, and if
a dangerous part cannot be so fenced, the Act implicitly prohibited its use.
The court stated that part of a machine is dangerous if it might be reasonably
foreseeable expected to act in circumstances, which may be reasonably expected to
occur.
The Abrasive Wheels Regulations 1970 in practice have modified the provision of the
Act in respect of this type of machinery.
The House of Lords endorsed the views expressed in Davis v Thomas Owen Co Ltd
(1919)
where it stated “The statute does not say that dangerous machinery shall be
securely fenced if that it is commercially practicable or mechanically possible. If a
machine cannot be fenced while remaining commercially practicable or mechanically
useful, the statute in effect prohibits its use”.
The defendant argued that if a grinding wheel was securely fenced the machine would
be unusable. The court rejected this proposition and refused to read the words so far as
is reasonably practicable into the statute.
This case created the situation that all grinding wheels were illegal unless the entire
wheel was contained within a guard. To overcome this, the government introduced the
Abrasive Wheels Regulations 1970 (since revoked) which permitted a lower standard of
guarding than that required by the Factories Act.
While operating a power driven grinding machine, Mr Frost's thumb got through a small
gap between the guard and the grinding wheel. He claimed compensation for his injury,
alleging breach of statutory duty.
