On his initiative a meeting took place with the Minister for Sport, two of Mr Hamlyn's colleagues, the Board's Chief Medical Officer, Dr Whiteson, and other board officials on 16th October 1991. 50. The brain benefits from the increased supply of oxygen and from a reduction in intra-cranial pressure in so far as this was attributable to excessive carbon dioxide. 72. e) The rule that any boxer selected to take part in a championship contest shall submit to the Board a satisfactory centralised tomography (CT) brain scan report not less than 28 days before the contest and a further scan report annually, so long as the boxer continues to take part in such contests. These cases turned upon the assumption of responsibility to an individual. This contention had some similarities to submissions made in relation to the Popular Flying Association in Perrett v Collins. The boxers display skill, strength and courage, but nobody pretends that they do good to themselves or others. Order: Appal dismissed with costs on the issues of liability and causation here and below, those costs to be assessed forthwith on to Legal Services Assessment; 18,000 in Court to be paid out in part satisfaction of those costs forthwith; detailed assessment on standard basis; Legal Services Commission taxation; application for permission to appeal to House of Lords refused. But the claimant does not come even remotely . There is no doubt that once the relationship of doctor and patient or hospital authority and admitted patient exists, the doctor or the hospital owe a duty to take reasonable care to effect a cure, not merely to prevent further harm. This contention had some similarities to submissions made in relation to the Popular Flying Association in. There was also an ambulance standing by which had resuscitation equipment and a paramedic who knew how to use this. On 21st September 1991 Michael Watson fought Chris Eubank for the World Boxing Organisation Super-Middleweight title at Tottenham Hotspur Football Club in London. In his Witness Statement, Mr Morris accepted that the following averment in the Statement of Claim was "basically correct": "at all material times, by reason of the effective control over boxing that the Board assumed, the Board was in a position to determine, and did in fact determine, the measures that were taken in boxing to protect and promote the health and safety of boxers. At this stage it is enough to note that the advice set out the professional expertise expected of the medical officers and details of equipment needed to perform their duties. It carried out this function by making and imposing rules dealing with the safety of boxers, by approving medical officers and by giving detailed guidance as to the qualifications and equipment those officers should bring to the ringside. The present case can only be decided on the basis of an intense and particular focus on all its distinctive features, and then applying established legal principles to it.". 20. "The fact that it was a person who foreseeably would suffer further injuries by a delay in providing an ambulance, when there was no reason why it should not be provided, is important in establishing the necessary proximity and thus duty of care in this case. The decision is of interest for several reasons. I do not believe that the evidence admits of any accurate answer to this question but that is by no means an uncommon situation in cases of this sort. Ringside medical facilities were available, but did not provide immediate resuscitation. It seems to me that, but for the intervention of the Board, the promoter would probably owe a common law duty to the boxer to make reasonable provision for the immediate treatment of his injuries. . It was also important to have a prior arrangement with the hospital with a neurological unit, and with that unit placed on standby. He did not, however, identify any obvious stepping stones to his decision. A. The position is directly analogous with a hospital conducted, formerly by a local authority now by a health authority, in exercise of statutory powers. 3. In the event, without explanation, he was not tendered as a witness and objection was taken to the use of his witness statement. This ground of appeal would have been unsustainable. That case involved four further claims by children against local education authorities for, among other things, negligently failing to address their special educational needs. .Cited Portsmouth Youth Activities Committee (A Charity) v Poppleton CA 12-Jun-2008 The claimant was injured climbing without ropes (bouldering) at defendants activity centre. 100. In my view the Claimant makes his case on causation when he shows, as he has done, that with the protocol in place he would have been attended from the outset by a doctor skilled in resuscitation, who would have made any necessary inquiries of the neurosurgeons at St. Bartholomews, who would themselves have been on notice. These facts produced a relationship of close proximity between the Board and those of its members who were professional boxers. The Board contends:-. The Board is non-profit making. Before making any decision, you must read the full case report and take professional advice as appropriate. When carrying out the assessment and advising the education authority, did the psychologist owe a duty of care to the child? Some boxers employed their own doctors. 12. ", 126. Try and prevent and/or treat raised intracranial pressure. Subsequently they were incorporated in the Rules by an addition to Regulation 8. The rise in pressure inside the skull caused by the haematoma results in distortion of the brain. Only full case reports are accepted in court. 82. 59. In these circumstances there was insufficient proximity between the Board and the objects of the duty. This passage was approved by Lord Steyn when the case reached the House of Lords [1996] AC 211 at 235. He added : "If the plaintiff has been negligently injured by a failing by the PFA, I cannot see that it would be right to withhold relief from him simply on the ground that to grant that relief might cause a rise in the PFA's insurance premiums, or even cause a more expensive system of inspection to be substituted for that of the PFA.". In such circumstances A's conduct can accurately be described as the assumption of responsibility for B, whether `responsibility' is given its lay or legal meaning. The onlookers derive entertainment, but none of the physical and moral benefits which have been seen as the fruits of engagement in many sports.". Test. These recommendations Mr Hamlyn set out in a detailed paper for the Board two days later. In such a case the authority running the hospital is under a duty to those whom it admits to exercise reasonable care in the way it runs it: see Gold v Essex County Council [1942] 2 K.B. In relation to two of the cases involving special educational needs, Lord Browne-Wilkinson reached a different conclusion. 48. 61. Lord Browne-Wilkinson answered this question in the affirmative. 27. The numbers of those to whom the duty is alleged to be owed in the present case are not incompatible with the requirements of proximity. . There he arrived in the scanning room at 00.30 on 22nd September. In the leading judgment Hobhouse L.J. The child's parents will seldom be in a position to know whether the psychologist's advice was sound or not. b) A limit on the number of rounds to twelve (Rule 3.7). Boxing members of the Board, including Mr Watson, could reasonably rely upon the Board to look after their safety. expressed a similar view in Marc Rich & Co. v Bishop Rock Ltd [1994] 1 WLR 1071 at 1077: "Whatever the nature of the harm sustained by the plaintiff, it is necessary to consider the matter not only by inquiring about foreseeability but also by considering the nature of the relationship between the parties; and to be satisfied that in all the circumstances it is fair, just and reasonable to impose a duty of care. He went on to hold that, in relation to the child abuse cases, the statutory scheme was incompatible with the existence of a direct common law duty of care owed by the local authorities. In Watson v British Boxing Board of Control Ltd,l the Court of Appeal has upheld an unprecedented decision that a regulatory body can be liable for negligence in the exercise of its rule-making functions. This Court held that the Ministry of Defence had been under no duty of care to prevent the deceased from abusing alcohol to the extent that he did. * the treatment actually provided to Mr Watson. They alleged that the local authorities had provided services under which, in one case, educational psychologists and, in the other, advisory teachers provided advice to teaching staff and parents as to whether children had special educational needs. * The Board failed to ensure that those running the contest knew which hospitals in the vicinity had a neurosurgical capability. Apart from issues of statutory duty, the question arose in each group of cases whether (i) the local authorities owed, at common law, a duty of care to the children when considering their needs and (ii) whether professionals advising on the needs of children owed a duty of care to those children which, if broken, rendered the local authorities vicariously liable. This sequence can result in cumulative damage to the brain, leading sooner or later to death. Michael Watson MBE, born 15 March 1965, is a British former professional boxer who competed from 1984-1991. Medical knowledge does not enable one to say what, on the balance of probabilities, would have been the outcome if the protocol had been in place and followed. 118. The members of the Board are those who are involved in professional boxing. See Hedley Byrne & Co. Ltd. v Heller & Partners Ltd [1964] AC 465 and Henderson v Merrett Syndicates Ltd [1995] 2 AC 145. He should certainly carry an aphygomamometer and stethoscope, an ophthalmoscope, an auroscope, a patella hammer, a Brooks airway and a padded spatula in case of a rate occurrence of fitting and the need to establish an airway. Watson claimed that the British Boxing Board of Control had been under a duty of care to ensure that all reasonable steps were taken to provide immediate and effective medical attention and treatment in the event of his sustaining an injury, and he argued that the Board had breached that duty by not providing resuscitation treatment at ringside. In Barrett v. Ministry of Defence [1995] 1 WLR a naval rating drank himself into a state of insensibility at the Royal Navy Air Station where he was serving. 10. if(typeof ez_ad_units != 'undefined'){ez_ad_units.push([[320,100],'swarb_co_uk-medrectangle-3','ezslot_5',114,'0','0'])};__ez_fad_position('div-gpt-ad-swarb_co_uk-medrectangle-3-0'); Cited by: Cited Binod Sutradhar v Natural Environment Research Council CA 20-Feb-2004 The defendant council had carried out research into a water supply in India in the 1980s. Therefore, it is said, it is nothing to the point that the social workers and psychiatrist only came into contact with the plaintiffs pursuant to contracts or arrangements made between the professionals and the local authority for the purpose of the discharge by the local authority of its statutory duties. 4. It is on this basis that it is possible to draw a distinction between the doctor who goes to the assistance of the victim of a road accident and the hospital that receives that victim into its casualty department. Tort Case Law. 23. The professionals were employed or retained to advise the local authority in relation to the well being of the plaintiffs but not to advise or treat the plaintiffs". [1988] 1 AC 1074 at 1090; and Hotson v East Berkshire Area Health Authority [1987] 1 AC 750 at 783. 7. However, should this not be so, then the boxer's gumshield should be removed, an adequate airway established and the boxer put on his left side so that should he fit or vomit he will not obstruct his airway. 101. 88. In the event those same procedures could not have been begun before 23.25 at the earliest, to allow some time for an examination after the claimant's recorded time of arrival at the North Middlesex. Dr Ross, the Board's Chief Medical Officer for the Southern Area, was asked why the Medical Committee did not make the recommendations made after Mr Watson's injuries at an earlier stage. 107. A duty of care at this stage had been conceded by the Ministry of Defence, but in Capital and Counties v. Hampshire this Court commented at p.1038 that this was not surprising as the deceased was under the command of the officer concerned. In other words, he could have been resuscitated on site and then transferred for more specific care. I consider that the Judge was entitled to find on the evidence, that had the Hamlyn protocol been in place, the outcome of Mr Watson's injuries would have been significantly better. A primary stated object of the Board was to look after its boxing member's physical safety.
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watson v british boxing board of control 2001 case