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Originally Posted by AllanMcC
Reply With QuoteHere's a note of the judgment in the dancing on the ceiling case which gave rise to this thread:
A landlord was not liable as an occupier of land for injuries sustained by a tenant who had, whilst dancing on a garage roof that formed no part of her tenancy, fallen through a perspex skylight, because the danger had arisen from the tenant's activity rather than the state of the premises.
The claimant (S) sought damages for personal injury from the defendant landlords (P) on the basis of P's alleged negligence and/or breach of statutory duty. S was one of the tenants of a first floor flat rented from P. One side of the flat abutted a garage, also owned by P, which had a flat roof and two skylights covered by corrugated perspex. The only means of access from S's flat onto the roof of the garage, which formed no part of S's tenancy, was through windows at waist height within the flat. In the course of an evening party at the flat, during which alcohol was consumed although nobody was drunk, S was among five or six individuals who had climbed out onto the garage roof by clambering over a sofa put against one of the windows. S and the others were dancing in a circle around one of the skylights when S inadvertently stepped onto the perspex cover and fell through it, sustaining injury. S contended that P had been negligent or in breach of their duty of care under the Occupiers' Liability Act 1984 s.1(1)(a) in that they had not ensured that the skylight had a safe or suitable cover, and had not heeded its unsafe condition; had failed to warn or to notify her and the other tenants of the unsafe condition of the roof or to warn them not to go out there; and that there had been no proper system of inspection or maintenance of the skylights. S submitted that the condition of the premises was, therefore, dangerous. P contended that the premises did not come within s.1(1)(a) of the Act because the danger to S had arisen from an activity rather than the condition of the roof. P submitted that they were not liable where S and the others who had ventured out were sensible, educated adults who had gone onto the roof in the dark and when not wholly sober, and had then proceeded to dance around a perspex cover without looking carefully at what they were doing.
HELD: For a duty of care to arise under the Act, the danger referred to in s.1(1)(a) had to be due to the state of the premises and not a claimant's activity. In the instant case, there was no evidence that the skylight's perspex cover had been in a state of disrepair or indeed that corrugated perspex did not constitute a suitable cover, and no evidence had been adduced concerning the lack of a proper system of inspection or maintenance. S had failed to prove that P had been aware that anyone would make use of the roof, except their own agents in order to carry out any repair. Neither S nor any other tenant had ever received permission from P to go on to the roof for any purpose, and they were, in any event, educated and sensible people. In those circumstances, the premises themselves did not give rise to any danger within the meaning of s.1(1)(a), and S had, accordingly, failed to establish P's negligence or breach of duty, Keown v Coventry Healthcare NHS Trust (2006) EWCA Civ 39, (2006) 1 WLR 953 and Maloney v Torfaen CBC (2005) EWCA Civ 1762, (2006) PIQR P21 considered, Young v Kent CC (2005) EWHC 1342 distinguished.
- that's got my vote too! 
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