I just finished reading my friend’s very interesting posting that he wrote on his weblog http://bruneiresources.blogspot.com/ entitled Managing Disasters (again) http://bruneiresources.blogspot.com/2009/01/managing-disasters-again.html The loss of lives was really a sad thing to happen and my condolences to the families. On the question of who to blame for the countless number of houses that collapsed due to the torrential rain and floods, I thought I would give here a bit of an English legal perspective but I say this without prejudice. I am not here trying to give any form of legal advice but really to share with you some knowledge on how the law would most likely look at it in terms of apportioning blame. On that question of who can they blame, it really is a question of which “neighbor” owed the duty of care.The case of Donahue vs Stevenson (1932) is probably the one that will be cited by English lawyers in terms of answering that question. On August 26, 1928, May Donoghue sat in the Wellmeadow Café in Paisley and drank the defendant manufacturer’s ginger beer, which her friend had purchased for her. The bottle contained the decomposed remains of a snail. After drinking it, Donoghue suffered from shock and severe gastro-enteritis. As she could not sue under contract law since it was her friend, and not she, who had purchased the drink, she brought a claim on the alleged negligence of the ginger beer manufacturer. The case settled for £200. Lord Atkin, hearing the case, stated: “You must take reasonable care to avoid acts or omissions which you can reasonably foresee would be likely to injure your neighbor.” Negligence cases in their millions have been brought against manufacturers, drivers, employers, doctors, contractors, developers, local authorities, accountants, lawyers and even government departments under this principle.
If I take a flight on a commercial airline, the airline can’t really say I fly at my own perils and I should be at fault for taking that risk. This is because the law of negligence would consider me as the airline’s “neighbor” as I would be proximate in relationship with the airline (in this case it would be easy for me to say that the airline was my “neighbor” as I would have a contractual relationship with the airline) and thus there would be a reasonable duty of care owed by the airline to avoid acts or omissions that it could reasonably foresee that would be likely to injure me for instance engine failures in the event the aircraft was airborne. So one way to answer that question who can they blame is to find who is the proximate “neighbor” or “neighbors” who breached his/their duty of care that resulted in the damage to the houses? is it the developer who failed to provide proper drainage and strong retaining wall when the risk of your house collapsing was really a reasonably foreseeable risk? or is it your next door neighbour who built an illegal extension that he knew could pose some risk of damage to your house? or could this simply that no “neighbor” was at fault as it was simply an act of god? it is natural for people to blame those who are directly responsible for the injury or damage or those who have the resources to rectify the damage. What happened in the last few days is really a sad case for Brunei but I am very sure that it wont be the last that we see. If there are lessons to be learned, I would say strengthening our legal framework on the building code and enforcing them without fear or favour would be our first priority.
