Dear Sir/Madam

I own and run a laundrette in South London. Until recently I had three employees:

Amber, Gordon and Delphine, who were new to the job and employed for only five

weeks.

Being relatively inexperienced, Delphine overloaded one of the dry-cleaning

machines with garments and instead of filling it with a solution for dry cleaning

fabrics, she filled it with a solution we use for maintaining and cleaning the machine.

This caused a fire in the laundrette.

I immediately called the local fire brigade and managed to get Ella, a customer in the

laundrette at the time, Delphine and Gordon, out of the laundrette. Gordon was

uninjured but Delphine suffered second-degree burns. Ella had minor burns on her

feet.

Amber was still inside the laundrette and in order to rescue her, I went back inside

through the flames. Gordon saw me taking this action and had a severe

psychological shock and collapsed at the scene.

Mikella, another customer, was on her way to the laundrette and, having also

witnessed me going into the laundrette to rescue Amber, suffered a nervous shock.

The fire brigade attended the scene 20 minutes after I made the phone call but did

not have the correct length of water hose and was unable to extinguish the fire.

However, they managed to rescue Amber and I from the laundrette.

The fire caused significant damage. It destroyed all the garments in the laundrette

belonging to different customers, all the equipment and the interior of the premises

was blackened with smoke damage.

Delphine was taken to the local hospital for emergency treatment. The doctor that

attended to her was recently qualified and due to inexperience, administered the

wrong treatment. This caused Delphine's condition to deteriorate and she suffered

cardiac arrest and died.

Delphine's husband Fred was devastated by her death. On leaving the hospital, he

saw me and in anger punched me in the face, breaking my nose.

In addition to these problems I then received a letter signed by the owners of the

other businesses in the same street as the laundrette. They stated that the state of

the laundrette is a disturbing sight; that it had affected their trade and unless I took

immediate steps to repair it and compensate them for their loss, they were going to

bring a claim against me.

One of the neighbouring shops, the printing office of a local newspaper, published an

article in yesterday's edition of the paper, blaming me for the accident. The headline

of the article read:

"This is what happens when incompetent people operate a business"

The article was accompanied by a photograph of the fire damaged laundrette and

me. I am devastated and need your advice.

Tasks

1. In preparation for the meeting with Mr Smith using relevant case law and

statutory provisions, you need to produce a file of notes. In the file you must:

. Analyse the aims of tortious liability AC 1.1

. Analyse main examples of torts, their essential components, defences and

remedies AC 1.2

. Appraise the rules for prevention of harassment and intentional harms AC 1.3

2. From Mr Smith's letter you are clear that he showed a duty of care to his staff and

customers.

. Assess when a duty of care will be imposed AC 2.1

. Assess the consequences of third parties' interventions AC 2.2

. Illustrate circumstances when psychiatric harm can be compensated AC 2.3

2020 London Institute of Business & Technology LAW504: 4

For a Merit grade you must:

. Analyse the factors that may render damages 'too remote' 2M1

. Analyse the policy reasons behind limitations of recovery for psychiatric

harms 2M2

For a Distinction grade you must:

. Assess the application of public policy in limiting the scope of duty of care 2D1

3. Mr Smith is also concerned about his liability. In your file notes you need to:

. Distinguish between primary and vicarious liability AC 3.1

. Explain employers duties to provide safe system and place of work AC 3.2

. Examine occupiers' duties to visitors and non-visitors AC 3.3

4. In order to address the issues posed by local businesses and the article in the

local paper you need to:

. Distinguish between private and public nuisance claims AC 4.1

. Compare and contrast effective and ineffective defences AC 4.2

. Appraise the rule in Rylands v Fletcher AC 4.3

. Define libel and slander AC 5.1

. Assess the conditions for a claim in defamation AC 5.2

. Evaluate the utility of available remedies AC 5.3

For Merit grade you also need to:

. Assess the meaning and need of fault in nuisance claims 4M1

For a Distinction grade your file of notes must also include:

. An examination of the tension between freedom of speech and protection of

reputation. 5D1

. An analysis the prohibition of r ecovery for pure economic loss 2D2