Law of Delict Semester 2:
Theme 11: Liability for an omission....................................................................................4
Prescribed:............................................................................................................................. 4
Context:.................................................................................................................................. 4
Introduction:............................................................................................................................ 5
Wrongfulness: policy considerations.....................................................................................11
Test question practice:......................................................................................................... 14
Theme 12 Negligent misstatement and liability for pure economic loss.......................15
Prescribed reading............................................................................................................... 15
Introduction:.......................................................................................................................... 15
Context:................................................................................................................................ 17
Historical development......................................................................................................... 17
Thought process:.................................................................................................................. 19
Modern SA Law:................................................................................................................... 19
Policy considerations:........................................................................................................... 20
Theme 13: Interference with a contractual relationship..................................................23
Cases and information:.........................................................................................................23
Introduction:.......................................................................................................................... 23
Negligent interference with a contractual relationship:..........................................................24
Intentional interference with contractual relationship............................................................25
Theme 14: Professional Liability.......................................................................................31
Prescribed:........................................................................................................................... 31
Introduction........................................................................................................................... 31
Thought process:.................................................................................................................. 33
Negligence:.......................................................................................................................... 33
Medical practitioners:............................................................................................................ 35
Legal profession................................................................................................................... 40
Banks................................................................................................................................... 41
Theme 15 Injury or death of another.................................................................................43
Prescribed:........................................................................................................................... 43
Introduction:.......................................................................................................................... 43
Contracting parties:.............................................................................................................. 43
Claims by employers............................................................................................................ 44
Claims by heirs and legatees for reduced inheritance..........................................................44
Claims by heirs or family members for funeral costs............................................................44
Claim by executor for funeral and other expenses................................................................44
Claim based on injury of a dependant..................................................................................45
Action of dependants for death of a breadwinner.................................................................45
Theme 16: Pain and Suffering and Emotional Shock......................................................49
,Prescribed:........................................................................................................................... 49
Pain and suffering Introduction:...........................................................................................49
Pain and suffering: first component......................................................................................50
Second component: Loss in the amenities of life..................................................................51
Determination of quantum....................................................................................................52
Liability for emotional shock..................................................................................................53
Barnard v Santam:................................................................................................................ 56
RAF v Sauls......................................................................................................................... 57
Theme 17: Infringement of bodily integrity......................................................................57
Typical practical question:....................................................................................................57
Introduction........................................................................................................................... 58
Terminology:......................................................................................................................... 59
Infringement of one’s corpus................................................................................................59
Theme 18: Infringement of dignity........................................................................................62
Prescribed............................................................................................................................ 62
Introduction........................................................................................................................... 62
Dignitas:............................................................................................................................... 62
Dignity: insult........................................................................................................................ 63
Theme 19: Infringement of privacy...................................................................................67
Prescribed:........................................................................................................................... 67
Introduction........................................................................................................................... 67
Privacy:................................................................................................................................. 68
National Media and Another v Jooste...................................................................................70
NM v Smith........................................................................................................................... 71
Theme 20: Infringement of identity...................................................................................73
Identity:................................................................................................................................. 73
What is the right to identity in delict?....................................................................................73
Wrongfulness....................................................................................................................... 75
Intention................................................................................................................................ 75
Example cases:.................................................................................................................... 75
Theme 21: Infringement of reputation..............................................................................77
Prescribed:........................................................................................................................... 77
Introduction:.......................................................................................................................... 77
Requirement 1: factual infringement.....................................................................................78
Who can claim for defamation?............................................................................................78
Conduct: Publication............................................................................................................. 79
Harm: defamatory material...................................................................................................80
Causation: reference to the plaintiff......................................................................................83
Presumptions:...................................................................................................................... 83
,Le Roux v Dey...................................................................................................................... 84
Theme 22: Grounds of justification associated with infringements of personality
interests.............................................................................................................................. 87
Prescribed............................................................................................................................ 87
Introduction........................................................................................................................... 87
Truth in favour of public benefit............................................................................................87
Privilege or privileged occasion............................................................................................89
Bogoshi case:....................................................................................................................... 91
Liability of the mass media...................................................................................................93
Khumalo v Holomisa............................................................................................................. 93
Example cases:.................................................................................................................... 94
Practical application question example:...............................................................................95
Theme 23: Liability without fault (Strict liability).............................................................96
Prescribed:........................................................................................................................... 96
Introduction........................................................................................................................... 97
Why do we have this exception? Justification.......................................................................97
Liability for harm caused by animals.....................................................................................97
Theme 24: Vicarious Liability............................................................................................98
Prescribed............................................................................................................................ 98
Introduction........................................................................................................................... 99
Justification for vicarious liability.........................................................................................100
Requirement 1: Employer-employee relationship...............................................................100
Requirement 2: a delict.......................................................................................................100
Requirement 3: in course and scope of employment..........................................................101
K v Minister of Safety and Security.....................................................................................103
Minister of Safety and Security v F.....................................................................................105
Criticism.............................................................................................................................. 106
Conclusions........................................................................................................................ 108
Theme 25: Expanding liability of the state for harm arising from crime:.....................108
Nature of the state’s liability................................................................................................108
Expanding state liability for harm arising from employees’ negligent failure to prevent harm
........................................................................................................................................... 108
Expanding state liability for harm arising from employees’ intentional criminal wrongdoing 110
Alternative strategies:......................................................................................................... 110
Exam:................................................................................................................................. 110
,Theme 11: Liability for an omission
Prescribed:
Loubser & Midgley: Chapter 14
Minister van Polisie v Ewels 1975 (3) SA 590 (A)
Minister of Safety and Security v Van Duivenboden 2002 (6) SA 431
(SCA)
Van Eeden v Minister of Safety and Security [2002] 4 All SA 346 (SCA)
Minister of Safety and Security v Carmichele 2004 (3) SA 305 (SCA)
Context:
Law of delict revolves around compensation for harm which was caused wrongfully and
culpably
Must prove 5 general requirements for liability: harm, conduct, causation, wrongfulness,
and fault
o NB: distinguish patrimonial and non-patrimonial harm
Patrimonial harm: bodily injury or property damage/damage which causes financial
loss
Non-patrimonial harm: personality right injury, or by pain and suffering
Pain and suffering not only in the literal sense but also in the loss of the ability to
enjoy life
o Conduct? Human, voluntary conduct
o Causation: must be a link between conduct and harm suffered by plaintiff
Factual causation: still determined by the but-for test
Legal causation: should decide on a policy basis whether there is a sufficiently
close connection between the conduct of the defendant and the consequences.
Can the loss be attributed, in LAW to the defendant’s conduct? Method of
preventing boundless liability.
o Fault = 2 components
Accountability: ability to distinguish right and wrong and act accordingly
If accountable, then consider fault.
Generally, only interested in holding people liable where they are culpable
Manifests in intention or negligence does not make a practical difference
o Wrongfulness
Traditional v new approach
Whether there is a ground of justification
,Introduction:
Historical development:
Development of the law as it relates to omission relates directly to wrongfulness
Roman law:
o Also developed a law of delict
o Jurists in this time were practically orientated
o Case-by-case basis people would bring cases to praetor to give pronouncement on
legal issue and used writing of roman law jurists to help them
o Never a general position taken regarding liability for an omission
o Sometimes, liability ensued for failure to act but sometimes not
o Pure casuistic system, no general founding principles regarding liability for an
omission
RDL:
o General position: where somebody failed to act, liability would not follow. Negative
conduct/omission would not attract delictual liability
o Voet:
There should be liability in some cases
Sometimes, roman jurists argued that one should be held liable for harm arising
from a failure to act if the harm is a result of the defendant’s prior conduct
If you fail to act in a situation of danger created by your own prior conduct, you
should be held liable
Voet supported this view
Another case where liability should follow: express acceptance of duty: where
defendant accepted duty to prevent harm and failed to prevent harm, liability
should follow
o Matthaeus:
Idea was more in line with later Roman legal thinking
Should be held liable for a failure to act any time that this failure was brought about
through your culpable conduct
Legal position in other African jurisdictions and Customary law?
o Pre-colonial views on failure to act? Can this be brought in line with colonial thinking
or does it jar with it
o Need to start Africanising private law!
Modern SA law:
Halliwell v Joburg Municipal Council:
o First case which brought liability for omission in delict into light
o Involved plaintiff on a horse in JHB city centre when they still had tram lines
o Tram was built on cobblestone road, where the tram line and the cobblestone
connected it was very slippery and plaintiff fell as result of slippery road, severely
injured and instituted claim against municipality
o Failed to keep road in condition as a result of which he was severely injured, argued
council should be liable for failing to prevent harm
o At this stage, position was that your failure to prevent harm does not generally attract
delictual liability. Mere omission is not enough to hold somebody liable
o Doctrine that municipalities were immune from liability if you opened municipalities
or organs of state to liability, will lose valuable money and channel it away from
maintenance
o In this case, court moved away from immunity doctrine and said that we should
impose liability, but only if there was prior conduct
o If the defendant, through its prior conduct, created a danger and failed to act in
response to this risk, then liability could ensue.
, o “I think that where a road authority either constructs or repairs a street in such
a way as to introduce a new source of danger which would otherwise not have
existed, then it must take due steps to guard against that danger […] Any
omission to discharge this duty would entail liability in damages to any injured
person to whom it was owed”
Cape Town Municipality v Paine
o Plaintiff slipped and injured themselves on a road which was not well-kept by
municipality
o “[M]ere omission did not under the lex Aquilia constitute [liability]; it only did so when
connected with prior conduct.”
o Generally, an omission will not attract liability, but it will if it is connected with prior
conduct
o Confirmed the position in Halliwell
SA Railways and Harbours v Estate Saunders
o Defendant had a truck/vehicle which they loaded up with goods from the harbour
which were then delivered to customers
o Standing arrangement with customer x whereby they would unload the truck and then
they would leave the vehicle overnight and would collect at a later stage
o On this evening, they did not remove the vehicle and left it near the road
o Roads were poorly lit, person did not see truck and crashed into it and was killed
o Executor who acted on behalf of the estate instituted claim in delict arguing that
defendant failed to remove the truck
o In this decision, court applied prior conduct doctrine
o Claim was successful, but commentators argued that the doctrine was causing
conceptual issues
o Instead of dealing with fundamental issue of when a person can be liable for an
omission, we have shifted it to a different issue of prior conduct, but this is a difficult
question as there is always prior conduct which could date back infinitely. Where do
we draw the line regarding prior conduct? Which prior conduct should be connected to
defendants?
o Was it the decision to keep truck there overnight? But they had a standing
arrangement which worked fine and allowed for defendant to unload these goods in
this way.
o Different author considered municipality cases, argued that in some cases where the
municipality failed to keep roads in proper condition, courts said there was prior
conduct in some cases but in other cases they said that the disintegration of the road
was natural. Which is it?
Application of the prior conduct doctrine often led to arbitrary results
o Was a step in the correct direction, but it was not unproblematic
Application of doctrine, according to most academics, led to irreconcilable decisions
This contention was captured by Van Den Heever:
o “The doctrine of previous conduct is not a harmless shibboleth; it has caused
confusion and led our courts to give irreconcilable decisions unless we find the
reconciliation in pure casuistry.”
o We do not want to accept arbitrary results, and must develop a more coherent
solution to this issue
o His proposal:
General principle: whenever you were negligent/culpable, liability should be
imposed upon you in the case of an omission. If you fail to act and were negligent
or intentional in this failure, you should be liable.
If there is an omission and the defendant is at fault, liability should ensue. Fault
becomes the mechanism by which somebody will be held liable for an omission
BUT this approach was rejected
