The question of product liability was considered by
no fewer than four bodies in the 1970s: the Law Com-
mission, the Council of Europe, the Royal Commission
on Civil Liability (chaired by Lord Pearson) and the EC.
In every single case, the recommendations of these
bodies involved imposing strict liability on the manu-
facturer of defective products. In 1985 the EC Council of
Ministers adopted a directive on product liability and,
consequently, the British government was committed to
implementing changes to UK law within three years.
Part I of the Consumer Protection Act 1987 (CPA 1987)
implements the EC Directive.
Liability under Part I of the CPA 1987
Part I of the CPA 1987, which came into force on
1 March 1988, introduces a regime of strict liability
for personal injury and damage to property caused by
defective products. This means that a producer will be
liable for harm caused by his products unless he can
establish one of the defences provided by the CPA 1987.
It is no longer necessary for a claimant to prove negli-
gence. Nevertheless, to establish liability under the CPA
1987 the claimant must prove that:
■he has suffered damage;
■the product was defective; and
■the damage was caused by the defective product.
A ‘producer’ is defined in s 1(2) as:■the manufacturer of a product;
■in the case of a substance which has been won or
abstracted, the person who won or abstracted it, e.g. a
mining company producing iron ore; and
■in the case of a product neither manufactured nor won
or abstracted, but essential characteristics of which
are attributable to an industrial or other process hav-
ing been carried out, the person who carried out that
process, e.g. the producer of canned vegetables.
Section 2 identifies those who are liable for injury or
damage arising from a defective product. They are:
■the producer of the product (as defined in s 1(2));
■any person who by putting his name on the product
or using a trade mark or other distinguishing mark
in relation to the product has held himself out to be
the producer of the product, e.g. ‘ownbranders’ who
market goods under their own label, even though
manufactured by someone else;
■any person who imports the product into the EC in
the course of a business; and
■where the producer cannot be identified within a rea-
sonable time, any person who supplied the product,
e.g. retailers or wholesalers who cannot identify the
manufacturer of the product.The net of strict liability under the CPA 1987 is cast
fairly widely over the chain of supply with the objective
of ensuring that an injured consumer will have someone
in the EC against whom he can bring an action. How-
ever, there are some groups of people involved in the
supply of products who are not specifically caught in
the net. They include designers, retailers, repairers and
installers. (These people will be liable, however, if they
also fall into one of the categories of persons liable set
out in points 1– 4 above, i.e. a designer may be liable as
a producer.)
‘Product’ is defined by s 1(2) as any goods or electric-
ity. The definition covers not just finished goods but also
components and raw materials. Game and agricultural
produce which had not undergone an industrial process
were specifically excluded from the scope of the CPA
1987, as originally enacted. The CPA 1987 did not define
what was meant by an industrial process, and this had
given rise to some uncertainty. It was not clear, for
example, whether spraying crops amounted to an indus-
trial process. In 1999 the EC adopted an amending
Directive extending the scope of product liability to
primary agricultural products and game. The UK im-
plemented the amendment with effect from 4 December
2000.Defect (s 3)
Section 3(1) provides that there is a defect in a pro-
duct if the safety of the product is not such as persons
are generally entitled to expect. Section 3(2) specifies a
number of factors which should be taken into account
when deciding what persons are entitled to expect. They
include:■the manner and purposes for which the product has
been marketed;
■the use of any mark, instruction or warning;
■what might reasonably be expected to be done with
the product; and
■the time when the product was supplied by the pro-
ducer to another.There have been relatively few reported cases of liability
under the CPA 1987 being established. The following cases
are examples of where the courts have imposed liability.Part 3Business transactions