A Particular Risk of Violence
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1983.tb02555.x |
| Author | Brenda Barrett |
| Date | 01 November 1983 |
| Published date | 01 November 1983 |
Nov.
19831
NOTES
OF
CASES
785
services in a welfare state, but it is not a solution which can be regarded
as
politically neutral.
As
such it is a pity that this decision, the first in
England and Wales which makes reference to
Re Resch,
implicitly
accepts the most controversial aspect of Lord Wilberforce’s judgment
without discussing its underlying assumptions.
The judgment also has implications for the relationship between
charity and the private sector. Gibson
5.
examined not only the need
of the aged for community housing but also the need for charities to
supply such housing and accepted evidence that provision
by
private
firms was inadequate.16 It seems reasonable to suppose that he would
not have allowed the charities
to
sell housing to the elderly if private
supply was deemed sufficient. This seems contrary to existing authority
which allows charities to duplicate services provided through the
market.” Yet if charities are to supply expensive capital assets to large
sections
of
the public at prices which reflect their favoured tax status,
they can expect to be excluded from competing with private enterprise.
RICHARD
NOBLES*
A
PARTICULAR
RISK
OF
VIOLENCE
THERE
is
a need for employers to have an authoritative statement of the
nature and extent of the employer’s duty to protect his employees from
personal injury resulting from violent attacks made upon them during
the course of their employment.
West
Bromwich
Building
Society
Ltd.
v.
Townsend
appeared to afford the opportunity for such guidance, but,
in the event,
so
many matters were reviewed as to detract from its
authority upon this issue.
The appellant Building Society had had an improvement notice
served upon it by the respondent inspector while purporting to exercise
powers conferred upon him under section
21
of the Health and Safety
at Work Act
1974.
The notice alleged that the Society was in breach
of
the general duty imposed upon it by section
2(1)
of
the Act, which
requires
“
every employer to ensure,
so
far as
is
reasonably practicable,
the health, safety and welfare at work of all his employees.” The notice
required the Society to erect bandit screens at the branch
to
which the
notice related, in order to separate the part
of
the premises where
employees worked from the public area. On the Society’s appeal under
section
24(2)
of the Act to an industrial tribunal against the notice the
tribunal found that the risk to employees from robberies was more
than minimal and that the measures required by the notice were both
physically and financially within the society’s capability: the tribunal
therefore upheld the notice.
~~ ~
l6
Supra,
note
2
at
288.
*
Lecturer
in
Law,
London
School
of
Economics
and
Political Science.
Incorporated
Council
of
Law Reporting for
England
and
Wales
v.
Attorney-General
(19721 Ch.
273; [1972)
3
All
E.R.
1029.
(19831
I.C.R.
257.
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