Trespass in UK Law

First, the defendant's conduct was inconsistent with the rights of the owner (or other person entitled to possession). Third, the conduct was so extensive an encroachment on the rights of the owner as to exclude him from use and possession of the goods. If these cause damage they may give rise to claims for trespass or in negligence, but they do not constitute conversion.

The question to which this appeal gives rise is whether the law today should recognise that the public highway is a public place, on which all manner of reasonable activities may go on. Provided these activities are reasonable, do not involve the commission of a public or private nuisance, and do not amount to an obstruction of the highway unreasonably impeding the primary right of the general public to pass and repass, they should not constitute a trespass.

Instead of dividing actions for personal injuries into trespass (direct damage) or case (consequential damage),we divide the causes of action row according as the defendant did the injury intentionally or unintentionally. If he does not inflict injury intentionally, but only unintentionally, the plaintiff has no cause of action to-day in trespass. His only cause of action is in negligence, and then only on proof of want of reasonable care.

A cause of action is simply a factual situation the existence of which entitles one person to obtain from the Court a remedy against another person. But it is essential to realise that when, since 1873, the name of a form of action is used to identify a cause of action, it is used as a convenient and succinct description of a particular category of factual situation which entitles one person to obtain from the Court a remedy against another person.

However, the defendant may put in evidence to seek to establish that he has a right to do what would otherwise be a trespass. Then the court must consider the application of the principles set out in American Cyanamid v. Ethicon Ltd. [1975] A.C.396 in relation to the grant or refusal of an interlocutory injunction.

The only relevance of the defendant's profits is that they are likely to be a helpful reference point for the court when seeking to fix upon a fair price for a notional licence.