What exactly was Mr Paris doing in Stepney Borough Council’s garage in May 1947, asks Carrie de Silva
Throughout my years of studying and teaching law I have read a good many law reports but not, I will admit, for every case encountered, or even for every case mentioned in lectures. Paris v Stepney Borough Council [1950] UKHL 3, [1951] 1 All ER 42, was one such, and will be well known to many, if not all, readers. It involved the finding of negligence against an employer for not ensuring that a one-eyed workman in a garage wore goggles, with the consequence that he was injured in his one good eye and rendered blind (his other eye having been lost on active service in 1941). Expert witnesses opined that it was not usual industry practice for (fully-sighted) men to wear goggles in carrying out this sort of work.
The question posed was: did an employer owe a duty of care to the claimant where, while the likelihood of injury was the same as for a fully-sighted man, the consequence of any such injury was
