Limitation of Actions in UK Law

First one has to ask whether, as between the alleged wrongdoer and the person who has suffered damage there is a sufficient relationship of proximity or neighbourhood such that, in the reasonable contemplation of the former, carelessness on his part may be likely to cause damage to the latter—in which case a prima facie duty of care arises.

Nature of the damages recoverable and arising of the cause of action. Subject always to adequate proof of causation, these damages may include damages for personal injury and damage to property. In my opinion they may also include damage to the dwelling-house itself; for the whole purpose of the byelaws in requiring foundations to be of certain standard is to prevent damage arising from weakness of the foundations which is certain to endanger the health or safety of occupants.

Under the Limitation Act, 1939, the period of limitation was six years in all actions founded "on tort"; but in 1954 Parliament reduced it to three years in actions for damages for personal injuries, provided that the actions come within these words of Section 2, sub-section (1), of the Law Reform (Limitation of Actions) Act, 1954: "Actions for damages for negligence, nuisance or breach of duty (whether the duty exists by virtue of a contract or of a provision made by or under a statute or independently of any contract or any such provision) where the damages claimed by the plaintiff for the negligence, nuisance or breach of duty consist of or include damages in respect of personal, injuries to any person".

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.

To justify dismissal of an action for want of prosecution the delay relied upon must relate to time which the plaintiff allows to lapse unnecessarily after the writ has been issued. A late start makes it the more incumbent upon the plaintiff to proceed with all due speed and a pace which might have been excusable if the action had been started sooner may be inexcusable in the light of the time that has already passed before the writ was issued.

If this were a matter governed by the common law I would hold that a cause of action ought not to be held to accrue until either the injured person has discovered the injury or it would be possible for him to discover it if he took such steps as were reasonable in the circumstances.

The Law Commission has now completed and published its review of the law of limitation of actions (2001, Law Com. 270) and the government has accepted its general recommendations with a view to legislation as soon as time permits.