Personnel Today
  • OHW+
  • Join
  • Resources
    • Clinical governance
    • Disability
    • Ergonomics
    • Health surveillance
    • OH employment law
    • OH service delivery
    • Research
    • Return to work and rehabilitation
    • Sickness absence management
    • Wellbeing and health promotion
  • Conditions
    • Mental health
    • Musculoskeletal disorders
    • Blood pressure
    • Cancer
    • Cardiac
    • Dementia
    • Diabetes
    • Respiratory
    • Stroke
  • CPD
  • Webinars
  • OHW Awards
  • Jobs
  • Personnel Today

Personnel Today

Register
Log in
Personnel Today
  • OHW+
  • Join
  • Resources
    • Clinical governance
    • Disability
    • Ergonomics
    • Health surveillance
    • OH employment law
    • OH service delivery
    • Research
    • Return to work and rehabilitation
    • Sickness absence management
    • Wellbeing and health promotion
  • Conditions
    • Mental health
    • Musculoskeletal disorders
    • Blood pressure
    • Cancer
    • Cardiac
    • Dementia
    • Diabetes
    • Respiratory
    • Stroke
  • CPD
  • Webinars
  • OHW Awards
  • Jobs
  • Personnel Today

Vicarious liabilityLatest NewsHealth and safety

Worker loses £300,000 compensation claim after injury at Christmas party

by Aidan Gray 11 Apr 2019
by Aidan Gray 11 Apr 2019

A charity worker has lost a £300,000 claim for compensation after she was picked up and dropped at her Christmas party.

The judge ruled that 61-year-old Sandra Shelbourne, an animal technician for Cancer Research UK, should not be entitled to a payout from her former employer because this could be seen as “health and safety gone mad”.

Shelbourne was attending a Christmas party hosted by the charity in 2012, where she claims she was “manhandled” by a scientist from its Cambridge University research campus, Robert Bielik. Her claim for compensation was first heard last May, but was unsuccessful.

She told the High Court, where her case was this week heard on appeal, that Bielik was “inebriated” and “an accident waiting to happen”, and that she had suffered back injuries as a result of his behaviour. She said she has been unable to return to work in the six years since the incident.

She reported that he had also picked up three other women before grabbing her. Her barrister told the High Court that his “behaviour in picking up women without their consent” at the party was inappropriate and “gave rise to a duty on the part of her employers to intervene”.

In her first claim, the judge said that Bielik “would clearly be liable to Mrs Shelbourne in damages for trespass to the person and in negligence”, but that she had no grounds for a claim against Cancer Research UK on the basis of vicarious liability.

At her appeal this week, Mr Justice Lane reiterated that she “deserved sympathy” but while Bielik was “clearly liable” for the incident it would go against common sense for the charity to be blamed.

He added that such a decision could lead to any works party involving alcohol to require measures such as legal declarations and risk assessments, which “as a matter of common sense cannot be right”.

Avatar
Aidan Gray

previous post
Brexit extension: Will employers be kept in the dark?
next post
Menstruation: Is period pain a disability?

Leave a Comment Cancel Reply

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

You may also like

Tarmac not liable for injury resulting from ‘horseplay’,...

12 Jan 2022

Seven key employment law cases from 2020

17 Dec 2020

How Covid-19 has added to ‘insider threat’ risks

7 Jul 2020

Barclays not liable for sexual assaults committed by...

2 Apr 2020

Six employment law cases that will shape 2020

14 Jan 2020

Supreme Court hears final Barclays appeal in sexual...

28 Nov 2019

Morrisons’ vicarious liability appeal reaches Supreme Court

6 Nov 2019

Morrisons data leak: implications for employers

2 May 2019

Morrisons granted permission to take data breach case...

17 Apr 2019

Worker loses £300,000 compensation claim after injury at...

10 Apr 2019
  • Strathclyde Business School expands its Degree Apprenticeship offer in England PROMOTED | The University of Strathclyde is expanding its programmes...Read more
  • The Search for Talent: Six Major Employer Pitfalls PROMOTED | The Great Resignation continues unabated...Read more
  • Navigating the widening “Skills Confidence Gap” in 2022, and beyond PROMOTED | Cornerstone OnDemand conducted a global study...Read more
  • Apprenticeships are the solution to your recruitment problems PROMOTED | Apprenticeships have the pulling power...Read more
  • What it really means to be mentally fit PROMOTED | What is mental fitness...Read more
  • How music can help to ease anxiety at work PROMOTED | A lot has happened since March 2020, hasn’t it?...Read more

Personnel Today Jobs
 

Search Jobs

PERSONNEL TODAY

About us
Contact us
Browse all HR topics
Email newsletters
Content feeds
Cookies policy
Privacy policy
Terms and conditions

JOBS

Personnel Today Jobs
Post a job
Why advertise with us?

EVENTS & PRODUCTS

The Personnel Today Awards
The RAD Awards
Employee Benefits
Forum for Expatriate Management
OHW+
Whatmedia

ADVERTISING & PR

Advertising opportunities
Features list 2022

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Linkedin


© 2011 - 2022 DVV Media International Ltd

Personnel Today
  • OHW+
  • Join
  • Resources
    • Clinical governance
    • Disability
    • Ergonomics
    • Health surveillance
    • OH employment law
    • OH service delivery
    • Research
    • Return to work and rehabilitation
    • Sickness absence management
    • Wellbeing and health promotion
  • Conditions
    • Mental health
    • Musculoskeletal disorders
    • Blood pressure
    • Cancer
    • Cardiac
    • Dementia
    • Diabetes
    • Respiratory
    • Stroke
  • CPD
  • Webinars
  • OHW Awards
  • Jobs
  • Personnel Today