The Portsmouth Roman Catholic Diocesan Trust appealed against a decision of the High Court that it was vicariously liable for the torts allegedly committed by a parish priest in their diocese. In a majority judgment the court dismissed the appeal. Though it was common ground that a priest was not an employee, an examination of the recent cases on clergy employment indicated that whether or not there was a contract of service between a minister of religion and his Church depended on the facts of the case, that there was no general presumption of a lack of intent to create legal relations between a cleric and the Church and that it did not follow that an ecclesiastical office-holder could not be employed under a contract of service. The court held that Viasystems (Tyneside) v Thermal Transfer (Northern) Ltd [2005] EWCA Civ 1151 had established that for the purposes of vicarious liability the tortfeasor did not have to be an old-fashioned employee. Davis LJ stated that the time had come to announce emphatically that the law of vicarious liability has moved beyond the confines of a contract of service. Leave to appeal was refused. [Frank Cranmer]
No CrossRef data available.