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On the evening
of August 26 1928, May Donoghue of Glasgow, a single mother of
modest means but much determination, travelled from her tenement
home in downtown Glasgow to a small teashop in the adjoining
town of Paisley, a journey that would take her to the centre
stage of legal history.
May Donoghue
was with a friend, it was this friend who placed the
short order that would change the course of legal history
around the world, the Scotsman ice-cream float.
The café owner
is said to have brought the ice cream tumbler and to have
poured on it some ginger beer from a brown opaque bottle
bearing the name "D Stevenson, Glen Lane Paisley". After
May Donoghue had taken a drink, and while her friend was
refilling her glass, May saw floating out of the bottle,
what she believed to be the partly decomposed remains of
a snail. She said she was made ill by what she had consumed
and what she thought she saw, and had to have treatment both
from her doctor and at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary. Bearing
in mind that the Welfare State was not in existence at this
time so Mrs Donoghue must fund treatment through her own
purse.
Mrs Donoghue
sued Stevenson's, the makers of ginger beer, for damages.
She argued that it was their duty to make sure snails didn't
get into the bottles of ginger beer they produced.
The judges
decided that Mrs Donoghue was right. One of them, Lord Atkin,
said that people had a duty in law not to do anything which
they should realise might cause injury to other people.
The judges
decided that Stevenson's owed Mrs Donoghue a duty of care,
which they had broken. She could be awarded damages (compensation)
to make up for her suffering.
Now put
yourself in the position of a judge and try to decide whether
any of these cases are affected by the judgement in Mrs.
Donoghue's case. In other words do you believe the injuries
were a result of a broken duty of care?
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