Food Poisoning in UK Law

The statutory prohibitions are designed to protect the insured by seeking to ensure that undesirable persons are not authorised to carry on insurance business and that authorised insurers remain solvent. Good public policy and common sense therefore require that contracts of insurance, even if made by unauthorised insurers, should not be invalidated.

This is part of the construction exercise, as opposed to a separate process of correcting mistakes, or a summary version of rectification: Chartbrook at [23]. First, there must be a clear mistake in the language or syntax in the contract, as distinct from the bargain itself: Honda Motor Europe Ltd v Powell [2014] EWCA Civ 437 at [37] (Lewison LJ).

The judge was satisfied on the evidence that Mr and Mrs Wood suffered illness as a result of the contamination of the food or drink they had consumed. Proving that an episode of this sort was caused by food which was unfit is far from easy. It would not be enough to invite a court to draw an inference from the fact that someone was sick. Additionally, other potential causes of the illness would have to be considered such as a vomiting virus.

As to the first problem, I agree with the Master of the Rolls in thinking that the law must be such that, in a factual situation where all have the same actual or imputed knowledge and the contract contains no term limiting the damages recoverable for breach, the amount of damages recoverable does not depend upon whether, as a matter of legal classification, the Plaintiff's cause of action is breach of contract on tort.

It does not follow that because references to harassing a person include alarming a person or causing a person distress (s7(2)), any course of conduct which causes alarm or distress therefore amounts to harassment ( Thomas v News Group Newspapers [2001] EWCA Civ 1233 at [29]). Essentially it involves persistent conduct of a seriously oppressive nature, either physically or mentally, targeted at an individual and resulting in fear or distress ( Thomas v News Group Newspapers at [30]).

I further agree with Stocker L.J. that the court should be wary in its approach to holding parents in breach of a duty of care owed to their children. It is accepted that the duty owed by Mr and Mrs Hughes, as foster parents, to the plaintiff was exactly the same as that owed by the ordinary parent to his or her own children. There are very real public policy considerations to be taken into account if the conflicts inherent in legal proceedings are to be brought into family relationships.

Secondly, there is the offering of an advisory service: in so far as this is merely part and parcel of the defendants' system for discharging its statutory duties, liability will be excluded so as not to impede the due performance of those duties (see Lord Browne-Wilkinson in X at 763D).