The High Court has provided guidance on the correct approach to assessing an occupier’s duty of care relating to foreseeable risk. Henry Morton Jack reports
In Ryan Andrew Cockbill v David Riley [2013] EWHC 656 (QB), the claimant, who was born on 17 June 1990, sustained a catastrophic spinal injury in an accident on 20 July 2006, while attending a party at the defendant’s home to celebrate, along with the defendant’s daughter and others, the end of their GCSE examinations. The claimant entered a large paddling pool in the garden and suffered a serious hyperflexion injury resulting in a fracture of the spine and consequent incomplete tetraplegia. The defendant, who was present throughout the evening, had bought a limited amount of alcoholic drink, namely a 12-pack of small bottles of Budweiser beer and 12 bottles of Vodka Kick.
The pool in which the claimant suffered injury had been brought by one of the guests and filled by the defendant. The claimant had not taken swimwear to the party and did not know there would be a paddling pool provided. He arrived at about
