Common law library

• Gives you guidance on all the different torts in one place
• Presents you with unequalled explanation of the general principles
• Goes through the various torts, chapter by chapter
• Covers common law, statutory, individual and commercial torts
• Includes mini-contents list at the start of each chapter
• Provides guidance on responsibilities and obligations
• Details all possible remedies, such as damages and injunctions
• Sets out possible defences and arguments that you can adopt
• Covers limitation periods
• Contains extensive use of case law and citations, cross-referenced throughout the text
• Includes consideration of relevant Commonwealth cases
• Considers the ongoing implications of the Human Rights Act 1998 on the law of tort

General Editor: Professor Michael A Jones is a Solicitor and Professor of Common Law at Liverpool University.

Consultant Editor: Professor Anthony M Dugdale is Professor of Law at Keele University.

Editors: Professor Richard Buckley, School of Law, University of Reading; Professor Andrew Burrows, Norton Rose Professorial Fellow in Law, St Hugh's College, University of Oxford; Professor Andrew Tettenborn, School of Law, University of Exeter; Hazel Carty, Senior Lecturer, University of Manchester; John Murphy, Reader in Law, University of Manchester; Robert Simpson, Reader in Law, LSE; Korieh Duodu, Practitioner, Schillings; Gillian Davies, Hogarth Chambers; Jenny Steele, York University.
Associate editor: Mark Simpson

• Major revision on the chapter on Economic Torts to take account of two House of Lords' decisions in OBG Ltd v Allan and Revenue & Customs Commissioners v Total Network SL
• The chapter on Breach of Confidence has been restructured to give greater prominence to the developing law of Privacy
• There have been a number of high-profile privacy cases since the last edition, and the litigation in Douglas v Hello! reveals the extent to which privacy concerns and commercial confidences are now protected

The House of Lords have handed down decisions in:

• Jain v Trent Strategic Health Authority — no duty of care owed by a public authority to owners of a nursing home when applying for an order to close the home and thereby destroy the owners livelihood
• Customs and Excise Commissioners v Barclays Bank Plc — no duty of care owed by bank to alitigant in whose favour a freezing order hasbeen granted
• Mitchell v Glasgow City Council on the duty owed by a local authority providing social housing and acting in accordance with statutory powers to a tenant to warn that another tenant had threatened to kill him (held that there was no duty to prevent harm being done by a third party)
• Smith v Chief Constable of Sussex Police — Hill v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire is still good law, and therefore the police owe no general duty of care to individuals in discharging their public duty of combating and investigating crime. The fact that a member of the public furnished a police officer with apparently credible evidence that a known third party presented a specific and imminent threat to his physical safety did not create a duty of care on the part of the officer to take reasonable steps to assess the threat and if appropriate to take reasonable steps to prevent it being executed
• Barker v Corus — ruling that when the modified causation test of Fairchild v Glenhaven Funeral Services applies defendants are liable only to the extent that they have materially increased the risk of harm to the claimant
• Gray v Thames Trains Ltd and Stone and Rolls Ltd v Moore Stephens on the defence of exturpi causa
• Corr v IBC Vehicles Ltd — where an individual sustains personal injury due to the defendant's negligence and as a result develops depression, his suicide while in a state of depression does not break the chain of causation between the negligence and the consequences of the suicide
• Rothwell v Chemical & Insulating Co — nonsymptomatic pleural plaques which evidence a claimant's exposure to asbestos do not constitute damage for the purpose of an action in negligence. Nor is a psychiatric condition which develops as a result of the claimant worrying about the possibility of developing cancer in the future due to exposure to asbestos actionable, because it is not foreseeable that an individual of normal fortitude would react to the small risk of future harm in this way
• The application of this Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights was the subject of detailed consideration by the House of Lords in Van Colle v Chief Constable of the Hertfordshire Police and Savage v South Essex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (on the duty owed by a public authority to a patient detained in hospital)
• In A v Hoare the House of Lords has overruled its own decision in Stubbings v Webb. Claims for trespass to the person now fall within s11 and s33 of the Limitation Act 1980 so that the limitation period is three years from the claimant's date of knowledge and the courts have a discretion under s33 to permit the action to proceed after limitation period has expired
• Ashley v Chief Constable of Sussex Police — the defence of self-defence requires not only an honest, but a reasonably held, belief by the defendant that he was about to be attacked
• Austin v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis on the lawfulness of the police tactic of"kettling" (containing a crowd in a confinedarea for several hours)
• R (on the application of Laporte) v Chief Constable of Gloucestershire on the meaningof a "breach of the peace" and the powers ofconstables to deal with an "imminent" breachof the peace
• In Jameel v Wall Street Europe the House of Lords has given detailed consideration to "Reynolds qualified privilege" as a defence to defamation, and has given the defence greater flexibility under the concept of "responsible journalism". Their Lordships also upheld the rule that entitles a company to sue for libel and claim damages without being required to prove identifiable financial loss
• Smith v Northamptonshire County Council and Spencer-Franks v Kellog-Brown & Root Ltd on the meaning of "work equipment" withinthe Provision and Use of Work EquipmentRegulations 1998
• Robb v M&I Salamis Ltd — proper to take into account an employer's obligations under reg 3(1) of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 (requiring employers to make suitable assessments of the risks to health and safety) when construing other regulations which impose civil liability (in particular regulations 4 and 20 of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998)
• Watkins v Secretary of State for the Home Department on misfeasance in public office

• Principles of Liability in Tort
• Causation in Tort
• General Principles
• General Defences
• Joint Liability and Contribution
• Capacity and Parties
• Vicarious Liability
• Foreign Torts
• Negligence
• Breach of Statutory Duty
• Professional Liability
• Product Liability and Consumer Protection
• Occupiers Liability and Defective Premises
• Employers' Liability
• Public Service Liability
• Trespass to the Person
• Malicious Prosecution
• Wrongful Interference with Goods
• Deceit
• Trespass to Land and Dispossession
• Nuisance
• Rylands v Fletcher Liability
• Animals
• Defamation
• Malicious Falsehood
• Economic Torts
• Statutory Intellectual Property Rights
• Passing Off
• Breach of Confidence
• Damages
• Injunctions
• Self-Help
• Discharge of Torts
• Limitation