Trustees of the Roman Catholic Church for the Archdiocese of Sydney v Kondrajian

[2001] NSWCA 308

NSW Court of Appeal

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Interrogate

Catchwords

1. Tort Law
2. › Negligence
3. › Duty of care
4. › School's duty to pupils
5. › Sporting activities
6. › Whether teacher breached duty of care by allowing mixed-age participation in modified hockey game
7. › Whether safety instructions and training were adequate
8. › Whether fatal injury resulted from breach of duty or unforeseeable concatenation of circumstances
1. Tort Law
2. › Negligence
3. › Breach of duty
4. › Foreseeability of risk
5. › Magnitude and probability of risk
6. › Sporting injuries in school context
7. › Whether foreseeable risk of serious injury from school sport establishes breach of duty
8. › Wyong Shire Council v Shirt [1980] HCA 12
1. Tort Law
2. › Nervous shock
3. › Psychiatric injury
4. › Mother's claim for nervous shock arising from death of child at school
5. › Whether breach of duty of care to pupil entitled parent to recover for psychiatric injury

Quick Take

A school does not breach its duty of care to pupils merely by allowing children to participate in sporting activities that carry foreseeable risks of serious injury, provided the game is suitable for the age group, adequate safety instructions are given, and the game is properly supervised. The occurrence of a catastrophic injury from an unexpected concatenation of circumstances does not establish breach of duty where the risk that materialised was extremely remote. Courts must guard against hindsight reasoning when assessing whether a teacher's conduct was reasonable.