Winfield and Jolowicz on Tort

Citation

Goudkamp, J., & Nolan, D. (2020). Winfield and Jolowicz on Tort (20th ed.). Sweet & Maxwell.

Chapter Summary

Context and Argument

Winfield and Jolowicz on Tort is a long-established reference textbook on the English law of tort, first published more than eighty years before this edition and now revised by James Goudkamp and Donal Nolan. The publisher describes the twentieth edition as thoroughly updated, with several chapters extensively rewritten, a new section on damage in negligence, coverage of new legislation and of the effect of Brexit, and fuller citation of academic commentary. The book is centred on English law but also draws on developments in Commonwealth countries and, where relevant, European systems. It has twenty-six chapters, which move from general questions about the subject through the individual torts to the rules that apply across them.

Chapters 1–3: Introduction; Influences on Tort Law; Foundational Concepts

The opening chapters ask what tort law is for and how it differs from contract, unjust enrichment, equitable wrongs and crime, and they take up the "compensation culture" and common criticisms of the tort system. Chapter 2 treats historical and contemporary influences, including the European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act. Chapter 3 introduces the building blocks used throughout: volition, intention, negligence, strict liability, motive and malice.

Chapter 4: Intentional Interference with the Person

Battery, assault and false imprisonment, acts intended to cause physical or emotional harm, and the Protection from Harassment Act 1997.

Chapters 5–7: Negligence

Chapter 5 follows the duty of care from Donoghue v Stevenson through Anns v Merton to Caparo Industries v Dickman, and then deals with problem areas such as omissions, dangerous situations and assumption of responsibility. Chapter 6 covers breach of duty: the reasonable person, the standard of care and proof of negligence. Chapter 7 treats damage, causation and remoteness, including loss of a chance, factual and legal causation, multiple causes and intervening acts.

Chapters 8–13: Statutory and Specialised Liabilities

Chapter 8 covers breach of statutory duty and misfeasance in a public office. Chapter 9 deals with employers' liability, and Chapter 10 with liability for land and structures under the Occupiers' Liability Acts 1957 and 1984, including the position of trespassers, landlords and builders. Chapter 11 sets out liability for defective products at common law and under the Consumer Protection Act 1987. Chapter 12 covers liability for statements, namely deceit and negligent misstatement. Chapter 13 treats defamation, privacy and related matters, including the effect of the Human Rights Act 1998 and the Data Protection Act 2018.

Chapters 14–20: Land, Animals, Goods, Economic Interests and Legal Procedure

Chapter 14 is trespass to land, Chapter 15 nuisance, and Chapter 16 the rule in Rylands v Fletcher. Chapter 17 addresses liability for animals. Chapter 18 covers interference with goods (trespass to goods, conversion and detinue). Chapter 19 turns to intentional interference with economic interests: inducing breach of contract, the unlawful means tort and conspiracy. Chapter 20 deals with abuse of legal procedure, such as malicious prosecution and abuse of process.

Chapters 21–26: Rules That Cut Across the Torts

Chapter 21 explains vicarious liability and the relationships that give rise to it. Chapter 22 covers joint and several tortfeasors and contribution. Chapter 23 sets out remedies, including compensatory, punitive, aggravated and nominal damages and injunctions. Chapter 24 deals with death in relation to tort, Chapter 25 with the capacity of minors, corporations and others to sue and be sued, and Chapter 26 with defences such as consent, necessity, self-defence and statutory authority.

Key Concepts

Chapters 1–4: Foundations and Intentional Torts

• Aims and boundaries of tort: compensation, deterrence and justice, and the line between tort and other branches of the law.
• Fault, intention and strict liability: the basic bases of liability set out in Chapter 3.

Chapters 5–7: Negligence

• Duty of care: the test for when the law imposes an obligation to take care, traced through the leading cases.
• Breach and the reasonable person: the standard against which the defendant's conduct is measured.
• Causation and remoteness: the factual and legal links between breach and the harm suffered.

Chapters 8–13: Statutory and Specialised Liabilities

• Occupiers' liability: duties owed to visitors and to trespassers under two statutes.
• Product liability: strict liability for defective goods under the Consumer Protection Act 1987.
• Negligent misstatement: liability for careless words, which depends on a special relationship.
• Defamation and privacy: the protection of reputation and of private information.

Chapters 14–20: Land, Goods and Economic Interests

• Nuisance and Rylands v Fletcher: interference with the use and enjoyment of land.
• Conversion: wrongful dealing with another's goods.
• Economic torts: inducing breach of contract, unlawful means and conspiracy.

Chapters 21–26: General Rules

• Vicarious liability: responsibility for another's tort arising from a relationship such as employment.
• Contribution between tortfeasors: how liability is shared where several are responsible for the same damage.
• Remedies and defences: the types of damages and injunctions, and the defences that reduce or defeat a claim.

Critical Analysis

Strengths

• Complete coverage in one volume. The contents run from the intentional torts and negligence through nuisance, defamation, economic torts and abuse of legal procedure to capacity and defences. A reader meets every topic a tort syllabus is likely to include, and the less common ones such as animals and goods.
• Rules that cross the torts are in separate chapters. Vicarious liability, multiple tortfeasors, remedies, death, capacity and defences each have their own chapter at the end, so they can be consulted on their own.
• Currency. The publisher lists recent decisions that the twentieth edition discusses, among them Robinson v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police on duty of care, Patel v Mirza on illegality, and Barclays Bank v Various Claimants and WM Morrison Supermarkets v Various Claimants on vicarious liability.
• A wider view than English law alone. The publisher stresses the use of Commonwealth and European material, which helps with questions about where English law might develop.

Limitations

• A reference work first. The book is organised as a comprehensive account of the law, not as a course. It offers little guidance on what a first-year student can safely skip.
• Edition. A twenty-first edition appeared in 2025 and restructured the book, so chapter numbers and some titles in this guide belong to the 2020 edition only.
• A textbook, not a casebook. It explains the cases and the commentary on them, but it is not a text-and-materials book, so students who want to read the judgments themselves must find them separately.
• English law only as a baseline. Courses on other jurisdictions will need local material.

Where It Fits in the Course

Among the tort-law books on the site, this is the full-length reference treatment of the English law of tort. Horsey and Rackley's Tort Law is a shorter course textbook built around leading cases and policy, and Markesinis and Deakin's Tort Law, McBride's Tort Law and Street on Torts are other textbooks for the main syllabus. Any of them is a more manageable first read; Winfield and Jolowicz is what students turn to for more detail on a point, or for the less common torts those books treat briefly.

Lunney, Nolan and Oliphant's Tort Law: Text and Materials is the better choice for reading extracts from judgments and scholarship. Gatley on Libel and Slander goes much further into defamation than Chapter 13. Atiyah's Accidents, Compensation and the Law and Stevens's Torts and Rights are, respectively, a study of the wider compensation system and a theoretical argument about what torts protect, so they supplement the doctrine here rather than replace it.

How to Use This Book

The book is aimed at law students and practitioners who need a reliable statement of the law. It assumes no prior knowledge of tort, though a first-year student will find it dense as a first read.

Use it by topic rather than cover to cover. The core for most courses is Chapters 4–7, followed by Chapter 21 on vicarious liability, Chapter 23 on remedies and Chapter 26 on defences. Read Chapters 1–3 for the framework, then Chapters 8–13 and 14–17 according to the topics taught. Chapters 18–20, 22, 24 and 25 are more specialised and can be read on demand.

For essay work, begin with the relevant chapter, then follow its citations of the cases and of academic commentary. Before relying on a point of current law, check it against recent decisions, because the book states the law as of its edition.