Introduction to Tort Law

Tort is a branch of the civil law (as opposed to criminal law) which provides a remedy for a wrongfully inflicted injury or loss or for infringement of a protected interest. Tort creates a right on part of the claimant and at the same time, imposes a duty or obligation on the defendant to not invade that interest.
There are different types of interests protected by law:
Physical Integrity
Interests in Property
Interests in the use and enjoyment of land
Reputation
In tort a monetary sum is given to compensate the claimant for the harm that is inflicted, i.e it puts the claimant in the position he/she would have been in if the wrong had not been done. Sometimes courts order an Injunction, which can provide a remedy in some tort claims and are most commonly used in the torts of nuisance and trespass. An injunction is an order of the court prohibiting a person from doing something or requiring a person to do something.
There are two main mechanisms for compensating innocent victims of actionable injury or loss. These are known as loss shifting and loss
spreading.
Loss shifting is where the loss that the innocent claimant suffers is shifted onto the defendant by forcing the defendant to pay the claimant damages.
Loss spreading as a principal of compensation expresses the idea of so called distributive justice - the spreading of losses among a number of people.
Let’s now ponder upon the defining characteristics of tort law.
Tort shares certain characteristics found in criminal law and contract law.
Unlike contract law which seeks to enforce a single obligation - a promise - the wrongs of tort are wide-ranging. Another distinction between contract and tort is that the content of a tortious obligation is fixed by law. For example, if I knock you down by carelessly driving my car, I am liable to compensate you because the law imposes a duty to drive carefully
and not because I have promised you that I will do so. In contract, it is the parties who (through their various negotiations) determine the content of a contract. Therefore, breach of contract involves the breach of an obligation voluntarily undertaken by the person in breach. So, if I fail to deliver the car that you have bought from me, I am liable to compensate you because I have failed to carry out my promise.
Now let's take a peek at criminal law. Criminal law is the body of law that deals with crime and the legal punishment of injuries to the public. A crime is an offence against the state and the purpose of a sanction is to punish the offender. Tort law which happens to be a civil law domain deals with the disputes between individuals, organizations, or between the two in which compensation is awarded to the victim. Tort is not primarily concerned about punishing, and unlike criminal law it is focused not on the interests of the state but on the individual victim of a tort. Additionally, the main purpose of criminal law is to maintain the stability of the state and society by punishing offenders and deterring them and others from defending. While tort’s main purpose is to deal with disputes between individuals. In criminal law it is the jury who decides if the defendant should be convicted if guilty or acquitted if not found guilty, while in tortious claims it’s the judge who decides whether the defendant is found liable or not. In criminal law the burden of proof is beyond reasonable doubt, while in tort on the other hand burden of proof is the preponderance of the evidence. Lastly, in criminal law the defendant is innocent until proven guilty, however, in tort claimant must give proof however, the burden may shift to the defendant in situations where the thing speaks for itself.
For a claim to succeed, the defendant’s intentional or careless conduct must lead to damage (that is loss or injury) of a kind that is recognizable in tort. People claim to contract diseases as a result of exposure to harmful substances, they claim to suffer economic loss as a result of negligent advice. They claim to suffer psychological or emotional illness as a result of the malicious transmission of information.
The types of damage that are recognizable in tort include but are not limited to:
physical damage to the person or property
psychological damage resulting from physical harm or the apprehension of physical harm
interference with land
economic loss
In Jobling v Associated Dairies Ltd , the defendants were liable in
negligence when the plaintiff sustained a back injury at his place of work. This injury led to a 50 per cent reduction in his earning capacity. Three years later, and before trial of his negligence action, the onset of a disease of the spine left him totally unfit for work. Because the second event was brought about by natural causes the House of Lords held that the defendants were only liable for the reduced earning capacity up to the time of the onset of the disease.
Before we conclude let’s talk about defects and damages.