12 June 2008
X v Hounslow London Borough Council [2008] EWHC 1168, [2008] All ER (D) 337 (May)
A local authority may be held to be under a duty of care to protect vulnerable adults from abuse by third parties. The correct approach in such a case is to consider the defendant as a single entity. Each of its sections and departments is under a duty to communicate to the others, and amongst its own relevant members of staff. The authority cannot be regarded as a collection of distinct departments or sections, whose knowledge, acts and omissions are to be judged independently of those of the others.
