Where does Duty of Care cease?
 

I'm not entirely sure this is the right place, but I'm after some discussion here.
I hear the term duty of care at work regularly. I am familiar with the idea that an action or activity should, within reason, not cause harm, whether unintentional or otherwise, to others as the 'Duty of Care'. This is, I suppose the crux of The Health and Safety At Work act in the UK.
Where I am unclear though is the use of the term 'Duty of Care' as it seems to be applied to modern servicemen when off duty.
How much does my boss owe DoC to me if I were I in my accommodation?
At what point does that become unreasonable?
Does it matter what type of accommodation is occupied, whether on or off base?
What if I deemed it to be intrusive?
What responsibility does he have for me when I am off duty? (don't start the 'paid 24 hours a day stuff', it won't wash)
Many years ago the services would intervene in many aspects of a servicemans life (classically taking control of the chequebook etc) which would not be tolerated now.
So, what do you think? Is there any legal opinion out there, or should we just continue to make things up as we seem to now?

Well, there's this

Duty of care in English law - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

and if you understand it, please, please explain it to the rest of the grown ups on here!

Madness, sheer madness.

And while we are on this theme I gather every flying activity now needs a formally appointed "Duty Holder" (already abbreviated to DH), and no that's not the auth! Nobody was able to explain what level they sit at (CinC, Base Commander, Aircraft Captain - or are we all duty holders in our own right?)Does seem like it's something emanating from our new MAA??

And how about "Operational Safety Cases" - that's another intriguing one.

I can't really be specific with duty of care under the armed forces because I'm not sure how much it covers.

Usually an employer has a duty of care over the safety of their employees, making sure the environment is safe and to prevent any unjustifiable harm. The legislation most used is Donoghue v Stevenson 1932 AC 562 which allows the courts to decide where the level of care should be.

I always understood it to be based on reduction of danger through risk assessment and/or provision of equipment as opposed to it being anything to do with having hot running water or 'a boss who cares'. It'd be interesting to know what your circumstances are to think your accom is 'intrusive', especially in these days of austerity. If your moan is something to do with sub-standard accom(?) then QRs would be a more practical place to start than the rather vague DoC concept, which I'm sure is far more subjective.

Thanks to those who have chipped in so far. I think I am content with the principle of DoC in terms of employer/employee relationships hence the allusion to HASAW, and also the accountability for actions on the public etc. My OP however is where that 'duty' lies with regard to off duty servicemen and how that squares with modern concepts of privacy and ultimately the ECHR. As a relic of the Cold War I think my own, instinctive answer is now probably wrong.

Is there a special DoC that should be extended to the military in the circumstances outlined in my OP?

Dallas, its not a moan, I was using my circs to specifically anonymise the query, ie trying to make it a general principle.

Even in civvie life its a muddy line sometimes, I work for the police and nowadays we often get calls from social services to check on people, for various reasons, often made at 1650 hrs just before their offices are closing for the night.

We know that these are likely to be passed to us simply because they didnt get round to it at and they want to go home, however when I tell an Inspector of the call he states "We have a duty of care" even if social services didnt think they did.

Goes without saying most of these calls are pure cr@p when we bottom them out.

In the real world of common sense, DoC should be no more or less, than taking care to not set someone up, for a fall, injury, or other personal detriment, that could be created by fault on your behalf.

Unfortunately for all of us, smart-ar$e lawyers, intent on huge, fast bucks and personal glory, have commenced manipulating laws and legal systems, to the point, where any personal responsibility is removed from judicial rulings, and madness is the result.

One is expected, via these extremist and unreasonable rulings, to be able to foresee any amount of stupidity on a clients behalf, and one is also expected to take steps to prevent this level of gross stupidity. At some time, somewhere along the line, surely common sense will again prevail in the legal system?

Clicker,

I work for the Police also and have experienced the same problems. Like folk abusing our Duty of Care and calling 999 to get officers to attend their property just so they can get a little bit of attention.

In the 21st century, common sense does not maximize billable hours for lawyers.Those who make decisions in real time will always be trumped by those who depend on extensive (years) and expensive (more than your income) research to prove that your decision was not optimal given all the information which exists in the world. It's interesting that lawyers, when faced in court with a situation they don't have a ready answer for, request that time be stopped so that they can re-maximize their billings. For the rest of us, time is not stoppable and our decisions are left to be judged over cigars and cognac by the manipulators of the law.

In for a penny ...

Examples to which your boss might deem it necessary to exercise DoC when off duty might include:

Placing an hotel, bar, or location out of bounds because of the risk of your being harmed. His DoC here probably precedes any H&S b*ll*cks. Over 50 years ago, at the guardroom, there were photos of all the hotels etc that were placed OOBs.

Years ago you had to see permission to live out and the boss would vet your accommodation plans.

You needed permission to marry and he might persuade you not to marry someone, a foreign national for instance.

Too right and your only ultimate option was to get out.

Why not? If your off duty habits placed you at such risk that you were unable to perform your duty? He might forbid you hiring a car on det for instance.

How many years ago? I know where this was done to an officer only 20 years ago. Now he might just be asked to resign if he got in to severe money difficulties.

So I think it is a question of knowledge. He might place somewhere like Aya Napa out of bounds, or forbid you shopping in Peterborough in uniform, both are especial restrictions placed on you but not your civilian spouse. If he does not know that you are living dangerously, but has set out guide lines, thenhe is covered.

Two more examples: In Cyprus you do not need to wear a motor cycle crash helmet yet I bet your boss, or SSO require you so to do. In Cyprus you can go sports diving without a qualification. DCIs however required all servicemen to have a British diving qualification regardless of whether you are using service or tourist facilties. These all impinge on your liberties to kill and harm yourself. If, having written these rules, your boss then resecinded them you can imagine the cross examination in the court.

So, boss had DoC as far as a reasonable person can consider the risks.

In the event of an 'incident' it is sufficiently woolly to allow legions of Lawyers to drag out proceedings almost indefinitely for lots of money.

Cynical, moi?

Ummm, sorry, not really about "Duty of Care" but Chris Kebab did ask:

I struggle with the Duty Holder concept and I really should know (given my job). The concept predates the MAA by a long while so I don't know we can really pin this one on them, though maybe they're giving it a new focus. The POSMS/Def Stan 00-56 definition is:

(The definition in JSP 551, V3 is worded slightly differently but is essentially the same.) The trouble with this definition is that for any given system, it makes all sorts of people in all sorts of organisations Duty Holders because there are so many people with "specific responsibilities" for "safety management". In contrast, the way I hear the term used always seems to imply some sort of greatest or ultimate responsibility for safety management (or just safety), in particular for explicitly accepting the risks associated with a system (aircraft) performing a role.

I once sat in on a meeting where a small group of very smart MoD, industry and academia folks discussed the idea of Operational Safety Cases, what they were for, whether they were desirable and how best to put them in place. I should have been the tea boy cos. I didn't understand the subject that well but the one thing I did take away was the large number of different ideas people had about what an Operational (or, sometimes, Operating) Safety Case should be/cover/do/achieve. If anyone ever tries to talk to you about an Operational Safety Case, make sure they tell you what they mean (and don't be surprised if they can't!)

The OP is mixing up the Duty of Care with the Human Rights Act - which makes this more difficult to answer. My (quite superb) Admin colleague a few years ago did explain how the introduction of the Human Rights Act changed mil discipline. It essentially gave the individual the right to a private life without 'us' sticking our noses in. Basically, if the individual wasn't breaking regulations or laws, and it passed the Service Test, then it was up to them. My memory of the detail is blurred, but I've not been reported, charged or accused of anything under Duty of Care or Human Rights Act since!

PN, I know how things were 20 years ago, sadly they are different now, which is why I asked the question.
Mr H I don't think I am confusing DoC with the HRA.

It seems to me that DoC is an imperfect phrase when used away from the workplace.

Hypothetical example: after a good night in the mess it becomes clear that man A has had too much to drink. He lives in SLA. Is there a DoC on anybody to look after him?
If so, who?
Man B lives in FMQ, same questions apply.
Man C lives in town in private accommodation, again the same question.

Harley, my final illustrations from Cyprus were this week. I used the earlier examples to show that in fact very little has changed as far as responsibile leadership is concerned.

At my last unit I was responsible. At an off-unit function transport was provided.

Given your Man a, b and c cases, it is quite clear that responsibilities lie with those sober enough to ensure the safety of the man regardless of where he lives. There are many civilian cases where a company has been held to blame because they created the situation where the person got drunk.

In the case of a convivial evening in the mess I would hazard that the same rules would apply as the Service had provided the facility. If it was down the pub then again the boss, having a Service responsibility for the individual I would expect the same level of blame. While he might, in law, escape prosecution it would not do his career any good whatever.

PN, TVM I follow what you are saying.

Does anybody else have an alternate view?

When I went through IOT most people wanted to get as far away from Cranwell as possible whenever the opportunity arose. There were many clear weekends during the course and so many of the cadets would bomb-burst across the country from a Friday evening til Sunday night.

Several times though, particularly when returning from exercise, we were ordered (not asked but ordered) not to depart until the Saturday morning having had a good night's sleep. This p1ssed us off no end but with hindsight was probably a good idea. This was a clear case of duty of care intruding into off-duty time and was a direct result of an Officer Cadet on a previous course falling asleep at the wheel and ending up dead.

In a military environment, particularly during the training phases, any intrusion is largely a case of 'tough sh1t' and is likely to be non-negotiable regardless of your 'right to a private life'. I seem to remember, on a tenuously related note, an officer who was ordered by his boss not to play a rugby match in case he was injured prior to a deployment. He played, got injured and was court martialled for disobeying a direct order.

Same deal, not allowed to self-drive on returning home on the trooper from OOA.

Only in the RAF! What are we comming too!!