MORRIS v. CUNARD STEAM-SHIP COMPANY, LTD.

Employers owe inexperienced workers a duty to provide adequate instructions, warnings and supervision when their duties bring them near dangerous machinery. Where a worker might reasonably think that machinery should be used, the employer must explain the safe method of working and specifically warn against unauthorised operation.

A worker may be contributorily negligent even where the employer’s failure to warn caused the risk. Appellate courts should not disturb a first-instance apportionment unless exceptional circumstances make it unreasonable. They should likewise leave damages undisturbed unless the award is demonstrably or inordinately too high or too low.

Jack Charles Morris, a young steward in the bar stock gang of the defendants’ ship, was seriously injured when he operated a winch while lowering empty barrels and cases. He claimed that the defendants had failed to provide adequate warnings, instructions and supervision.

Mr Justice Pilcher found the defendants two-thirds responsible and Morris one-third responsible. He assessed total damages at £6,413 17s 2d, producing judgment for £4,275 18s 1d after the reduction for contributory negligence. The defendants appealed against liability and the apportionment. Morris cross-appealed against the assessment of general damages. The central issues were whether the defendants had breached their duty to an inexperienced worker, whether Morris was contributorily negligent, and whether the appellate court should interfere with the apportionment or damages.

The Court of Appeal unanimously dismissed both the defendants’ appeal and Morris’s cross-appeal.

1. Employer’s duty. The common-law duty to take reasonable care to avoid unnecessary risk included providing an inexperienced worker with adequate instructions and supervision when his duties brought him near a dangerous winch. If, without specific guidance, he might reasonably think that the winch was the proper means of carrying out the task, he had to be warned not to operate it and told how the work was to be performed. The principle stated in Cribb v Kynoch Limited, 1907 2 King's Bench 548, was applied. Singleton LJ and Jenkins LJ emphasised the absence of an effective warning; Parker LJ considered the failure to give task-specific instructions and supervision a clear breach.
2. Burden and factual finding. The legal burden remained on Morris to prove breach. Singleton LJ and Jenkins LJ considered that no issue of onus arose once the trial judge’s judgment was treated as finding that no warning had been given. Parker LJ regarded the trial judge’s apparent reliance on a shifted burden as a misdirection, but independently concluded on the balance of probabilities that Morris had not received the warning.
3. Contributory negligence. Morris was negligent in switching on unfamiliar dangerous machinery without seeking assistance from an experienced person, although the surrounding circumstances, including seeing others use the winch, reduced the weight of that fault. The one-third apportionment against him was therefore permissible.
4. Apportionment. Applying section 1, sub-section 1 of the Contributory Negligence Act 1945, the reduction had to be just and equitable having regard to the parties’ respective responsibility. The principle in The Macgregor, 1943 Appeal Cases 197, was followed: an appellate court should not alter a first-instance apportionment reached after consideration of all the facts, save in exceptional circumstances.
5. Damages. Although the general damages appeared low, they were not so inordinately or demonstrably low as to justify appellate intervention. The first-instance award was accordingly left undisturbed.

The appeal was dismissed with costs. The cross-appeal was dismissed, with no costs sought by the defendants. Leave to appeal was refused.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): In [1956] EWCA Civ 7, the defendants’ appeal and Morris’s cross-appeal were dismissed. The appeal was dismissed with costs; no costs were sought on the cross-appeal. Leave to appeal was refused.
• High Court: Mr Justice Pilcher’s judgment of 21 June 1956 found the defendants two-thirds responsible and Morris one-third responsible, with total damages assessed at £6,413 17s 2d.