Michael Watson was injured in a boxing match supervised by the British Boxing Board of Control (BBBofC or BBBC), which was expected to . I shall revert to the details of this when I come to consider the question of breach. This involves intubation, or the insertion of an endotracheal tube. 129. In an opinion read by Phillips MR, the court upheld Kennedy's decision, noting that it "broke new ground". The broad function of the Board is to support professional boxing. In the final round, Watson lost consciousness and was taken to the hospital, arriving there nearly half an hour after the end of the fight and received resuscitation treatment. His comment that "it would only have added three minutes or so if he had waited until he was summoned" suggests to the contrary. 3.10 The promoter shall procure that at all promotions a stretcher is available for use near the ring. Match. 71. The plaintiff's allegation is that during this process an alternative gearbox was fitted without the appropriate and corresponding substitution of a propeller which matched the substituted gearbox. It has the ability to require of promoters what it sees as good practice. Before confirming, please ensure that you have thoroughly read and verified the judgment. I turn to consider the extent to which there are categories of cases, in which a duty of care has been held to exist, or alternatively held not to exist involving these features. In 1991 there were only about 550 active boxers, of which almost all were semi-professional. Dr Shapiro examined Mr Watson and put a Brookes Airway into his mouth to maintain his airway. However, despite an English doctor's professional duty to offer their assistance, thi. I would echo the comment of Lord Steyn in Marc Rich & Co. v Bishop Rock Ltd [1996] AC 211 at p.236: "None of the cases cited provided any realistic analogy to be used as a springboard for a decision one way or the other in this case. Mr Watson's case, in essence, was that there should have been a different regime in place - Mr Walker described it as an intensive care unit at the ringside. In Marc Rich & Co v. Bishop Rock Ltd [1996] AC 211 a classification surveyor had surveyed a vessel laden with cargo and given it a clean bill of health. Test. In these circumstances there is no close proximity between the services and the general public. These facts bring the Board into close proximity with each individual boxer who contracts with a promoter to fight under the Board's rules. 8. The Judge accepted that this was the case but ruled that in the final analysis that it was for the Court to determine whether even the most widely followed practice was acceptable. . The Board encouraged and supported its boxing members in the pursuit of an activity which involved inevitable physical injury and the need for medical precautions against the consequences of such injury. He further alleged that had he received that treatment, he would not have sustained permanent brain damage. A Respondent's Notice was served contending that the Judge could and should have drawn an adverse inference from his failure to give evidence. In Barrett v. Ministry of Defence [1995] 1 WLR a naval rating drank himself into a state of insensibility at the Royal Navy Air Station where he was serving. [1988] 1 AC 1074 at 1090; and Hotson v East Berkshire Area Health Authority [1987] 1 AC 750 at 783. In contrast the injuries which are sustained by professional boxers are the foreseeable, indeed inevitable, consequence of an activity which the Board sponsors, encourages and controls. The agreed time of reception at the hospital was 23.22. * Enter a valid Journal (must had not been responsible for the claimant's asthma but it had caused the respiratory arrest and to this extent the L.A.S was the author of additional damage.". 93. [3] Watson spent 40 days in a coma and 6 years in a wheelchair, with doctors initially predicting that he would never walk again. Mr Watson's injuries were not, however, without precedent. This is a further factor which tends to establish the proximity necessary for a duty of care. The decision is of interest for several reasons. He held the Commonwealth middleweight title from 1989-1991. . In an open letter to BMA delegates, written some time in the 1980's, Dr Whiteson, the Chief Medical Officer to the Board, wrote "The British Boxing Board of Control is justifiably proud of its reputation of being in the vanguard of the protection of professional boxers." 77. In theory the medical officers at a contest would be appointed and paid by the Promoter from the body of approved doctors. The Board contends:-. 3. The patient is then artificially ventilated through this tube with oxygen. In such circumstances A's conduct can accurately be described as the assumption of responsibility for B, whether `responsibility' is given its lay or legal meaning. As Mr Morris accepted, by reason of its control over boxing the Board was in a position to determine, and did in fact determine, the measures that were taken in boxing to protect and promote the health and safety of boxers. 109. (Rule 8.1). In these circumstances the Board should owe no greater duty of care than that imposed on a rescuer, that is a duty to exercise reasonable care not to make the situation worse, but no duty to reduce the damage that would have occurred in any event had the rescuer not intervened - see Capital and Counties plc v. Hampshire County Council. It trades under the name of the "Popular Flying Association" and it appears that either its main role or one of its main roles is to run that association. Thus Mr Watson voluntarily submitted to any risk associated with inadequacy of medical safeguards. The doctors required by the rules to be present at a contest had to be doctors who had been approved by the Board. Mr Watson was the third boxer on whom Mr Hamlyn had operated for similar injuries. I shall have to examine the facts and reasoning in Perrett in due course, for Mr Mackay, QC, for Mr Watson has relied upon it as providing a close analogy with the present case. Dealing with the arguments of policy advanced on behalf of PFA, Buxton L.J. Considerations of insurance are not relevant. 125. There was no contract between the parties, but boxers had to fight under the Board's rules. The professionals were employed or retained to advise the local authority in relation to the well being of the plaintiffs but not to advise or treat the plaintiffs". 78. (pp.27-8). She claimed the respondent was liable under the Act and at common law for failing to keep it safe. But once the decision is taken to offer such a service, a statutory body is in general in the same position as any private individual or organisation holding itself out as offering such a service. The head teacher, being responsible for the school, himself comes under a duty of care to exercise the reasonable skills of a headmaster in relation to such steps as a reasonable teacher would consider appropriate to try to deal with such under-performance. Only full case reports are accepted in court. The Claimant would have been resuscitated within a few minutes of 23.00 and in St. Bartholomews by 23.45 at the latest. Watson v British Boxing Board of Control QB 1134 was a case of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales that established an exception to the defence of consent to trespass to the person and an extension of the duty of care expected in cases of negligence. 20. Therefore in giving that advice he owes a duty to the child to exercise the skill and care of a reasonable advisory teacher.". Watson v British Boxing Board of Control Ltd [2001] QB 1134 (CA) - BB was not insured but Court said it is irrelevant because a duty of care is decided regardless . James George, James George. The local hospital was close to the boxing ring and therefore the transfer occurred very quickly and during this period of time, as far as I can ascertain, his condition was satisfactory and the insertion of an endotrachael tube was not absolutely necessary. Whilst unattended he vomited and died as a result of inhaling his own vomit. As for the argument that the local authorities were vicariously liable for negligence on the part of those giving them advice, Lord Browne-Wilkinson held at pp.752-3: "The claim based on vicarious liability is attractive and simple. Mr Watson's case can be summarised as follows: i) The Board assumed responsibility for the control of an activity the essence of which was that personal injuries should be sustained by those participating. The members of the Board are those who are involved in professional boxing. I would simply comment that if the Board were given the statutory function of directing what medical assistance should be provided to boxers at the stadium, I consider that it would be at least arguable that they owed boxers a duty of care in exercising that function. If, which I doubt, this conclusion represents any step beyond what is already settled law, I am fully persuaded it is a proper one to take.". I do not believe that the evidence admits of any accurate answer to this question but that is by no means an uncommon situation in cases of this sort. In my judgment the Judge was entitled to conclude that the standard of reasonable care required that there should be a resuscitation facility at the ringside. [6] This was an extension to the previous duty of care under negligence, and also serves as an exception to the rule under trespass to the person that a defendant will not be liable for personal harm caused in sporting matches which the claimant consents to. His answer was that he was sure that these things were discussed but he could not remember. Hobhouse L.J. Watson claimed that the British Boxing Board of Control had been under a duty of care to ensure that all reasonable steps were taken to provide immediate and effective medical attention and treatment in the event of his sustaining an injury, and he argued that the Board had breached that duty by not providing resuscitation treatment at ringside. In any event, option B was the one that was undertaken. One group of cases involved statutory duties imposed on local authorities for the purpose of protecting children from child abuse. 3.5.1 A Referee shall officiate inside the boxing ring to score the contest and act as sole arbiter of the Rules of Boxing except for British and Commonwealth Championship contests, or other such contest that the Stewards in their absolute discretion deem appropriate. The doctors who were actually present were not aware of the desirability of immediate resuscitation of a victim with a brain haemorrhage. Dr Ross, the Board's Chief Medical Officer for the Southern Area, was asked why the Medical Committee did not make the recommendations made after Mr Watson's injuries at an earlier stage. Because the facts of this case are so unusual, there is no category in which a duty of care has been established from which one can advance to this case by a small incremental step. Nevertheless, defendants will likely seek to argue that their breach of duty made no difference to the claimant's eventual outcome - an argument that the British Boxing Board of Control ran unsuccessfully in the Watson case. In any event it would be quite wrong to determine the result of the individual facts of this case by formulating a principle of general policy that sporting regulatory bodies should owe no duty of care in respect of the formulation of their rules and regulations. This has relevance to a number of the points discussed above. Try and prevent and/or treat raised intracranial pressure. JURISDICTION TO INTERPRET A FEDERATION'S RULES OF PROCEDURE IN DOPING CASES41 a) Case of Smith v International Triathlon Union (Supreme Court of British Colombia, Vancouver, In Smoldon v Whitworth [1997] PIQR P133 the duty of care had been conceded in the context of a school colts game and similarly, boxing came under scrutiny in Watson v British Boxing. Thus in Capital and Counties v. Hampshire this Court held that a fire brigade was under no common law duty to answer a call for help or, having done so, to exercise reasonable skill and care to extinguish the fire. It does not seem to me to be profitable to speculate what the position would be if the Board had a statutory function in relation to boxing. In that case Hobhouse L.J. 9. These considerations lead to the final point made by Mr Walker in the context of proximity. Next the Board attacked the implicit finding of the Judge that the Rules should have required the doctor to enter the ring as soon as a boxer was counted out or deemed unfit to defend himself. It examines the ability of insurers to influence legislation relevant to the tort system. Without so doing, however, the Judge concluded that for some reason no thought was given to the practicality of introducing at the ringside what he found had been a standard response, where the presence of sub-dural bleeding was known or suspected, since at least 1980. Nothing that I have heard persuades me that there was any impracticality, whether in terms of manpower or in cost to the promoters, in the Board having included such a requirement in their rules. The Board, however, arrogates to itself the task of determining what medical facilities will be provided at a contest by (i) requiring the boxer and the promoter to contract on terms under which the Board's Rules will apply and (ii) making provision in those Rules for the medical facilities and assistance to be provided to care for the boxer in the event of injury. This care was insufficient, and as such Watson was in a coma for 40 days, and spent 6 years in a wheelchair. Therefore, it is likely that injuries arising from such play occur frequently but when do they occur as an act of negligence? He contended that they were in breach of this duty with the consequence that he did not receive the immediate medical attention at the ringside that his condition required. True it is that, in the absence of a statutory power or duty, the authority could not offer such a service. A. Lord Phillips MR Gazette 22-Mar-2001, Times 02-Feb-2001, [2000] EWCA Civ 2116, [2001] QB 1134, [2001] PIQR 16 Bailii, Bailii England and Wales Citing: Considered Perrett v Collins, Underwood PFA (Ulair) Limited (T/a Popular Flying Association) CA 22-May-1998 The plaintiff was a passenger in an aircraft which crashed, and there was a preliminary issue as to the liability to him of those who certified that the aircraft was fit to fly. On a preliminary issue the House of Lords held that the classification society had no duty of care to the cargo owners. That argument was rejected. Resuscitation equipment should be at ringside along with person(s) capable of using it". So far I have not dealt with the question of reliance by Mr Watson on the exercise of care by the Board. 47. 96. Lord Nicholls posed and answered the following question at p.802: "Take a case where an educational psychologist is employed by an education authority. If wrong information had not been given about the arrival of the ambulance, other means of transport could have been used". Letang v Cooper - Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 - Watson v British Boxing Board of Control - Bernstein of Leigh v Skyviews & General Ltd -. Of these, the vast majority were semi-professional. Michael Watson was injured in a boxing match supervised by the British Boxing Board of Control (BBBofC or BBBC), which was expected to provide medical care. Mr Watson collapsed unconscious within a minute or so of this. Lord Browne-Wilkinson answered this question in the affirmative. 56. 28. Later that day, there was a rise in intra-cranial pressure and a second operation was performed, on this occasion by Mr Hamlyn, to remove a new collection of blood and staunch a bleeding vein and artery. The essence of Mr Watson's case is that there should have been a system under which such equipment would not merely be available, but used immediately in the event of a brain injury. 67. It is, however, clear that the test is an objective one: Henderson v Merrett Syndicates Ltd., [1995] 2 AC 145, 181. Watson v British Boxing Board of Control 2001 QB 1134 was a case of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales that established an exception to the defence of consent to trespass to the person and an extension of the duty of care expected in cases of negligence. The article examines this regulatory framework; where traditional attitudes about the social desirability of sport and acceptance of harm support an autonomous self-regulatory approach, often insulated from the full application of the criminal law. .Cited Calvert v William Hill Credit Ltd ChD 12-Mar-2008 The claimant said that the defendant bookmakers had been negligent in allowing him to continue betting when they should have known that he was acting under an addiction. I think that the Judge was right. Dr Whiteson did not give evidence. I confess I entertain no doubt on how that question should be answered. His belief was that the brain damage that occurred in each case could probably have been avoided in whole or in a large part if the boxer had received immediate resuscitation at the ringside. By this time, however, he had sustained serious brain damage. Mr Block, the Secretary of the Board's Southern Area Council, reported to the Board that the arrangements in place were satisfactory and that the tournament could receive the Board's approval. It was accepted that, if the survey had been negligent the loss of the cargo was a foreseeable consequence. b) A limit on the number of rounds to twelve (Rule 3.7). In accordance with normal practice, the medical officers for the contest were nominated by the Southern Area Council. The General Medical Council clearly states that a doctor must offer help when off-duty, if an emergency arises. At this stage it is enough to note that the advice set out the professional expertise expected of the medical officers and details of equipment needed to perform their duties. The Board is non-profit making. In a nutshell, his case was that the resuscitation treatment that he received at the North Middlesex Hospital should have been available at the ringside, but was not. Treatment that should have been provided at the ringside. Sharpe v Avery [1938] 4 All E.R. 54. Lord Woolf M.R. There was no contract between the parties, but boxers had to fight under the Boards rules. It would seem impossible to contend that the plaintiff would not be affected by the decisions and plans drawn up by the architect.". She claimed in negligence and occupiers liability. 35. Elr, Recueil JP 01.02 3 a) Case of Michels v USOC (United States Court of Appeals - 7th circuit, 16 August 1984)40 B. In my judgment there is a clear distinction between the role of the Board and the role of a fire service or the police service.
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watson v british boxing board of control 2001 case
