Jurisdiction(s):
United Kingdom

Related legal acts

Key definition

Causation definition

What does Causation mean? Causation describes how the law links a person’s conduct to a harmful outcome, so as to establish liability in negligence and other torts/delicts, or guilt in criminal offences. - Factual causation: usually the ‘but for’ test—would the loss or injury have occurred but for the defendant’s act or omission? In limited circumstances, courts accept material contribution to harm or a material increase in risk (notably for indivisible diseases), and address multiple concurrent or successive causes. - Legal causation (scope of liability/remoteness): whether the kind of damage was reasonably foreseeable and whether any novus actus interveniens broke the chain of causation. The thin...

Occupational cancer litigation: duty, breach and causation, including mesothelioma’s Fairchild exception, doubling of risk, material contribution, foreseeability in asbestos cases, and evidential challenges

Published by a LexisNexis PI & Clinical Negligence expert

Practice notes

This Practice Note sets out the legal principles relevant to occupational cancer claims, concentrating on Causation and the approach the court will take in deciding whether the claimant has satisfied the burden of proof. As with other Personal injury actions, the claimant must demonstrate that:

the defendant owed them a duty
that duty was breached
the breach resulted in damage

Duty and breach

Where the defendant employed the claimant, disputes about the existence of a duty should rarely arise. Claimants ought to found their case on breaches of applicable statutory duties alongside Negligence at common law. Commonly, in disease claims said to stem from dust in a factory environment, the claimant will plead, according to the period of the alleged exposure, a breach of section 47 of the Factories Act 1937 or section 63 of the Factories Act 1961...

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Andrew Wilson

Andrew has more than 25 years’ experience of working in the fields of personal injury and occupational disease litigation, acting for both claimants and defendants. He trained at L Bingham & Co, gaining early experience in a number of important high profile claims involving the MIB. During the 1990s Andrew worked at Hextalls and then Kennedys, predominantly for defendants across a range of motor, employers’ liability and public liability matters many of which involved serious injuries or death. More recently, he has dealt with cases for claimants who have suffered serious injuries or occupational disease. He was a partner in a large specialist practice. He has provided seminars to solicitors and other legal professionals both for an external conference company and in house on the workings of the Civil Procedure Rules in the context of personal injury claims, amongst other...

Web page updated on 22/05/2026

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