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Is A Parent Accountable for the Actions of Their Child?

category Family Law

 Despite what you might initially think, a parent can, in certain circumstances, be held civilly liable for the actions of their child that cause damage to another. 
The basis for this liability is negligence. It has long been established that a person may come under a duty to act through their assumption of responsibility for another person. 
As stated in Todd, Law of Torts in New Zealand (2nd ed) “[I]n the case of parent and child a duty can arise from the parent’s knowledge of the child’s propensity to cause harm to himself or herself or to others by reason of youth, inexperience, mischievous or malicious disposition, obliging them to take such precautionary measures as are appropriate to their supervisory position.” 

Case law supporting this includes;
- a father being held liable for failing to prevent his 10 year old son (of known “reckless disposition”) from taking a rifle from the family home (which was a part of a tavern operated by the parents) and shooting a person: Kenealy v Karaka (1906) 26 NZLR 1118 (CA);
- a father being held liable where children took a gun from a houseboat and fired it, injuring a person: Curmi v McLennan [1994] 1 VR 513;
More recently the District Court has confirmed that the obligation on a parent is not without limitation.
In Walmsley v Taylor [2001] DCR 711 Perkins J considered a situation where a 2½ year old had climbed onto furniture and grabbed matches stored on a high shelf. She set fire to the property. The father was outside the house for the 10 minutes that this took to occur.
Perkins J considered “Can it be said…that the actions of the child would reasonably have been in contemplation of the father? As a matter of policy would holding the father liable in these circumstances be too great an interference or set too high a standard for the day-to-day activities of the normal household of young children?”
The Court determined that the father was not liable for the child’s actions and the resulting fire.
In the Court’s mind, the events of the day were a “freak combination of foreseeable circumstances” that the father could not be held responsible for.
The most obvious point of difference between the cases is that in those in which a parent was held liable, there had been previous bad behaviour by the child.
Arguably, this called for a higher level of parental supervision.
While it remains for parents to properly supervise their children, it is important to remember that common sense should prevail.
If a parent takes such precautions as are appropriate, bearing in mind the age of the child, the disposition of the child and their past behaviour, that parent should feel assured that they would not be held responsible for actions of their child that caused damage.
In every case, this would be a question of fact and degree.
John Flaus and Mike Mika are the family team at Preston Russell Law. You can contact them by clicking here.