Lamb v Camden LBC [1981] 2 All E.R. 408

C owned a house that suffered cracks walls and became unsafe to live in following the breakage of a water main. This occurred due to work by D to replace a sewer. C, in America at the time, arranged for her interests to be looked after. In summer 1974 she came back for six weeks and made preliminary arrangements for repairs to be done. C then returned to America. A group of squatters, having seen the unoccupied and unfurnished property, invaded it in October 1974. C’s solicitors got under order 113 to remove them. Boards were then put up to deter future squatters. In summer 1975, a second invasion occurred, with a shifting population of squatters moving in and out. Electricity and gas to the property were cut. The squatters then ripped out the central heating and other installations, stealing them.

Was the council responsible for damage deliberately caused by squatters after its negligent works had made the claimant's house temporarily uninhabitable?

Appeal was dismissed. The likelihood of squatters moving in was the wrong test to apply in the case, and as such D could not be held liable for the squatter’s actions. Lord Reid’s test in Dorset Yacht Co v Home Office [1970] Appeal Cases 1004-holding defendants liable for the criminal or tortious actions of a third party present because of the defendant’s negligence-should not be applied. The ‘very likely’ standard would extend the liability of government institutions beyond all reason. The factors of duty, remoteness and causation are all devices for the courts to limit the range of liability for negligence. It was C’s responsibility to have the squatters removed. It has not been suggested that D had such an obligation. D did not occupy the house and was never asked to remove them. Leaving the house unoccupied and unfurnished created the reasonably foreseeable risk that squatters would enter. The issue of money would not have prevented C from making the house secure. That C was uninsured is her misfortune.

A defendant who damages a house is not necessarily responsible for subsequent deliberate damage by third parties who enter it. In Lamb, the squatters' further damage was too remote from the council's original negligence; foreseeability did not by itself resolve the limits of responsibility.

The case illustrates the policy and causation difficulties raised by intervening wrongdoing. A damaged, empty house may attract intruders, but that connection does not make every consequence recoverable from the party responsible for the original damage. Compare Dorset Yacht, where preventing the very type of misconduct that occurred was central to the defendants' responsibility. Lord Denning's discussion of insurance belongs to the reasoning in this case, not a general defence available whenever a claimant could insure.