Factors Determining the Amount of Damages

Abstract

Two seemingly contradictory objections are raised against the traditional rules of liability for damage; on the one hand the requirement of fault appears to preclude just compensation of many persons who have suffered loss or injury, particularly such as is caused by modern dangers—motor traffic, the use, storage or transportation of high explosives, or the release of atomic energy. On the other hand damage caused by even the slightest degree of negligence may exceed by far what can justly be demanded from the person responsible.In Dunne v. North Western Gas Board no less that 46 coal gas explosions occurred simultaneously in the streets of Liverpool. The people injured were unable to recover because it turned out that the defect in the gas mains had developed without the fault of any person. In Fowler v. Lanning the plaintiff suffered injuries from pellets discharged from the defendant's gun. He pleaded this fact as a sufficient cause of action, leaving it to the defendant to explain the accident. That seems indeed to have once been the law. Today, however, the plaintiff has at least to allege negligence (if not intention) or to set out facts which “shout negligence”; only then does the rule res ipsa loquitur relieve him of the burden of proof, and then only of that burden alone. Ought not a hunter to be responsible for his gun, a gas board for its pipes?