Boyded Industries P/L v Canuto

[2004] NSWCA 256

NSW Court of Appeal

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Interrogate

Catchwords

1. NEGLIGENCE — respondent/employee injured herself when glass shattered after she sat on glass table at used car premises occupied by appellant/quasi-employer — respondent employed by owner of the premises Auburn Services Trust — whether the appellant or Auburn Services Trust was liable in negligence either as, or with duties equivalent to, the employer of employee — at time of accident appellant accepted employee had worked at those premises under its direction, supervision and control — whether respondent was contributorily negligent — extent of duty of care to maintain safe system of work — distinction between maintaining safe system of work and simple uncomplicated operation within normal system of work involving obvious danger in ordinary commonsense. — CAUSATION — whether causation and breach of duty were before trial judge — whether warning sign or verbal warnings would have averted accident — Van der Sluice considered — whether unsafe practice had developed — provision of safe working environment.

Quick Take

An employer's duty to provide a safe system and place of work does not extend to protecting employees against simple carelessness in the face of obvious everyday dangers, such as sitting on a glass-topped table. The majority distinguished between an unsafe practice that the employer should address and a simple uncomplicated act involving an obvious danger that falls within the employee's own responsibility. The dissent illustrates the alternative analysis where an employer has acquiesced in an unsafe practice developing among staff.