Compensability for Suicide: A Causation Dilemma

Abstract

When a person injured as a result of a breach of duty subsequently commits suicide in the context of mental illness caused by the breach of duty, difficult questions of causation arise. At one level it might seem unfair that those dependent upon the deceased are not able to recover against the tortfeasor if the personal injury constituting the pathology within which the suicide was committed was foreseeable. At another level, though, it might seem unfair for a tortfeasor to be held liable if suicide itself was a highly remote risk and not reasonably foreseeable. The House of Lords in Corr v IBC Vehicles Ltd [2008] UKHL 13; [2008] 2 WLR 499; [2008] 2 All ER 943 has adopted a liberal approach toward the causation question, but not finally resolved the circumstances and extent to which suicide by a person whose psychiatric state still allows them a level of autonomy will constitute contribution and therefore reduction in compensation by the defendant. The decision sits somewhat uncomfortably with the approach of the New South Wales Court of Appeal in AMP General Insurance Ltd v Roads & Traffic Authority of NSW [2001] NSWCA 186 and Sarkis v Summitt Broadway Pty Ltd [2006] NSWCA 358. In Australia, authoritative determination of the issue is required from the High Court so as to clarify whether the approach of the House of Lords is to be preferred to that of the New South Wales Court of Appeal.