Latest Cases

Negligence – Duty to take care. The claimant had owned a painting which he had sold at auction through the defendant auction house for £42,000. The defendant had assessed the painting as being a copy of a well-known work by Caravaggio. After the sale, the buyer, who was an art scholar of great renown, declared the painting to be by Caravaggio himself. The claimant issued proceedings against the defendant alleging negligence in its investigation of the painting. The Chancery Division dismissed his claim. It considered the scope of the duty of care owed by a leading auction house, as opposed to a provincial one, and concluded that the defendant had not been negligent in its assessment of the painting. 

Employment – Dismissal. In proceedings relating to alleged unfair dismissal, the question arose of whether the employees had been assigned to an organised grouping of employees within the meaning of the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006 SI 2006/246. The Employment Appeal Tribunal held that, among other things, the judge had failed to consider the organisational structure of the putative transferor and the role of the claimants. 

Extradition – Extradition order. The Divisional Court gave a definitive judgment that the evidence demonstrated that there were not substantial grounds for believing that there was a real risk that the appellant or the first interested party would face prison conditions that had been in breach of art 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights on extradition to Italy. Either the presumption was restored that Italy, as a European Union state, would fulfil its obligations under art 3 of the Convention or Italy had proved, by cogent evidence, to relieve the doubts. 

Personal injury – Breach of statutory duty – Liability – Quantum. Court of Session: In an action for damages by a joiner who sustained a head injury and a broken wrist in an accident at work, and suffered from pre- and post-traumatic amnesia, the court, having concluded that on balance of probabilities the pursuer fell when climbing a ladder and that the cause of the fall was probably that the ladder, being unsecured and placed on a new slidy chipboard floor, simply slipped, found liability for breaches of workplace regulations established, rejected a plea of contributory negligence, and awarded £30,000 for solatium and £10,000 for loss of employability. 

Employment – Race discrimination. The employee worked as a domestic worker for the employers. She brought a claim for race discrimination alleging that she had been treated in a demeaning manner, in part due to her low status, which were was infected with considerations of caste. The employers applied to strike out the claim, contending that 'caste' did not fall within the definition of 'race' in s 9 of the Equality Act 2010. The employment tribunal refused the application. The Employment Appeal Tribunal, in dismissing the employers' appeal, held that, whilst 'caste' as an autonomous concept did not come within s 9(1) of the Act, it was possible that the facts as found in the present claim might come within the scope of that phrase. 

Sentence – Sexual offences against children. The offender pleaded guilty to seven counts of sexual activity with a child contrary to s 9 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 and was sentenced to a total of 30 months' imprisonment. The Court of Appeal, Criminal Division, allowed a reference by the Attorney General and held that the sentence imposed had been unduly lenient in circumstances where the offender had taken advantage of a young and vulnerable girl. The sentence, in respect of the counts involving penetration, was substituted for one of four and-a-half years' imprisonment. 

Practice – Pre-trial or post-judgment relief. The claimant failed to enter a witness statement in time for statements to be exchanged and nevertheless sought to adduce the witness statement seeking relief from sanctions under CPR 3.9. The court was prepared to admit certain parts of the witness statement but not others as it would cause prejudice to the defendant. 

Professional negligence – Solicitor – Duty of care. Court of Session: In an action in which a bank sought damages for loss it claimed to have suffered as a result of its reliance on statements a solicitor made in an email during a property transaction, alleging it was misled into discharging security over three properties owned by the solicitor's client when only one property should have been released from security, the court held that there were misstatements in the email but that it was not reasonable for a bank in the pursuers' position to rely on the erroneous information without checking its accuracy; and that a solicitor in the first defender's position would not foresee that such a bank would reasonably rely on that information without carrying out such a check. 

Sentence – Sexual offences prevention order. The Court of Appeal, Criminal Division, in dismissing the claimant's appeal, held that the powers conferred under the Sexual Offences Act 2003 enabled a person who was subject to a Sexual Offences Prevention Order to be required to wear location monitoring device (a tag) when away from the premises at which he was residing or staying overnight. 

Employment – Wages. The employee brought a claim before the employment tribunal for unlawful deduction from wages from the employer's failure to pay her at scale 4. The tribunal dismissed the claim, having found that an agreement had been varied so that earlier benchmark job evaluations would stand and that a new job description had been drawn up in respect of the employee's job which gave rise to a re-evaluation of the claimant's job at scale 3. The Employment Appeal Tribunal, in dismissing the appeal, held that the tribunal had made decisions which had been open to it on the evidence.