Negligence In Civil Law

Meaning of negligence – negligence of a duty caused by the omission to do something which a reasonable man, guided by those consideration which ordinarily regulate the conduct of human affairs would do, or doing something which a prudent and reasonable man would not do.
Actionable negligence consists in the neglect of the use of ordinary care or skill toward a person to whom the defendant owes the duty of observing ordinary care and skill, by which neglect the plaintiff has suffered injury to his property.
According to Winfield, Negligence as tort is the breach of a legal duty to take care which results in damage, undesired bye the defendant to the plaintiff.
The definition involves three constituents of negligence:
1. A legal duty to exercise in Blyth v. Birmingham Waterworks Co as:
"Negligence is the omission to do something which a reasonable man guided upon those considerations which ordinarily regulate the conduct of human affairs, would do, or doing something which a prudent and reasonable man would not do."
The elements of negligence have been neatly summed up by Viscount Simond According to him; there are three elements of negligence, which the plaintiff has to prove before he may succeed in a claim for damages due to negligence. They being:
(a) A duty of care owed to him by the defendant;
(b) A breach of that duty by the defendant;
(c) The sufferance of loss by the plaintiff pursuant to the breach of that duty by the defendant.
Elements of "duty of care"
Before an action for negligence can succeed, it is essential that a "duty of care" exist between the plaintiff and the defendant. In Bourhill v. Young Lord Macmillan had explained the meaning of the term "duty of care". According to him, it is a duty to avoid doing or omitting to do something, which may have as its reasonable and powerful consequences, injury to others. The duty is owed to those to whom such injury may reasonably and probably be anticipated if the duty is not