Smith v. Stages 1989

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*928 Smith Respondent v Stages and Another Appellants
House of Lords
23 February 1989
[1989] 2 W.L.R. 529
[1989] A.C. 928
Lord Keith of Kinkel , Lord Brandon of Oakbrook , Lord Griffiths , Lord Goff of Chieveley and Lord
Lowry
1988 Oct. 24, 26, 31; Nov. 1; 1989 Feb. 23
Vicarious Liability—Master and servant—Course of employment—Defendant and fellow—employee

working away from normal place of employment—Employers paying for time spent travelling and
paying travelling allowance—Employees travelling in car belonging to defendant after working all
night—Employers having opportunity to direct method and time of travel—Defendant's car
involved in accident caused by defendant's negligence—Whether employers vicariously liable
The first defendant and M., who were based in Staffordshire, were instructed by their
employers to go to Pembroke to carry out a week's work which they were expected to start at
8 a.m. on Tuesday, 23 August 1977. They travelled there on the Monday, 22 August, for which
they were paid a day's wages and they were also paid a sum equivalent to the return rail fare.
The employers did not stipulate how they were to travel and they went in the first defendant's
car. In order to complete the work by the following Monday morning they worked for 13 hours
on Saturday, all day on Sunday and from 9 p.m. on Sunday night until 8.30 a.m. on the
following morning. They were paid for eight hours' sleeping time and eight hours' travelling
time for the return journey and were required to report for work in Staffordshire on the
Wednesday morning. In fact M. and the first defendant set off immediately in the first
defendant's car. Later that morning the car was in an accident and M. suffered serious head
injuries. He brought an action against the first defendant claiming damages for negligence.
After M.'s death in 1979 from an unconnected cause the claim was continued by his widow, the
plaintiff, who joined the employers, alleging that the first defendant had been driving in the
course of his employment. The judge found that the employers were aware that M. and the
first defendant would probably travel by car; that the travelling day at the conclusion of the
work was paid for as a working day; and that the employers had been entitled to direct how M.
and the first defendant should act during that day. He held that the first defendant was not
acting in the course of his employment while driving and dismissed the claim against the
employers but found in favour of the plaintiff against the first defendant. The Court of Appeal
allowed the plaintiff's appeal against the judge's dismissal of her claim against the employers.
On appeal by the employers:-
dismissing the appeal, that an employee who was paid wages by his employer to travel from
his ordinary residence to a place other than his usual workplace to carry out a job and was
*929 also paid wages for the return journey home was acting in the course of his
employment while travelling; that the fact that the employee might have a discretion as to the
mode and time of travel would not take the journey out of the course of employment; that, in
the circumstances, the first defendant was acting in the course of his employment when he
drove M. to Pembroke in his car, and that, accordingly, the employers were vicariously liable
for his negligence (post, pp. 934C-E,938D-H,939B-E,948D-F,954B,955G,956A-B,C-D,F).
St. Helens Colliery Co. Ltd. v. Hewitson [1924] A.C. 59 , H.L.(E.) applied.
Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292 , C.A. approved.
Decision of the Court of Appeal [1988] I.C.R. 201 affirmed.
The following cases are referred to in their Lordships' opinions:
0 Alderman v. Great Western Railway Co. [1937] A.C. 454; [1937] 2 All E.R. 408, H.L.(E.)
0 Barras v. Aberdeen Steam Trawling and Fishing Co. Ltd. [1933] A.C. 402, H.L.(Sc.)
0 Blee v. London and North Eastern Railway Co. [1938] A.C. 126; [1937] 4 All E.R. 270, H.L.
(E.)
0 Canadian Pacific Railway Co. v. Lockhart [1942] A.C. 591 ; [1942] 2 All E.R. 464, P.C.
0 Elleanor v. Cavendish Woodhouse Ltd. [1973] 1 Lloyd's Rep. 313, C.A.
0 Harvey v. R.G. O'Dell Ltd. [1958] 2 Q.B. 78; [1958] 2 W.L.R. 473; [1958] 1 All E.R. 657
0 Nancollas v. Insurance Officer [1985] 1 All E.R. 833, C.A.
0 Netherton v. Coles [1945] 1 All E.R. 227, C.A.
0 Nottingham v. Aldridge [1971] 2 Q.B. 739; [1971] 3 W.L.R. 1; [1971] 2 All E.R. 751
0 Reg. v. Industrial Injury Benefits Tribunal, Ex parte Fieldhouse (1974) 17 K.I.R. 63, D.C.
0 St. Helens Colliery Co. Ltd. v. Hewitson [1924] A.C. 59, H.L.(E.)
0 Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292; [1970] 2 W.L.R. 929; [1970] 2 All E.R. 335, C.A.
0 Weaver v. Tredegar Iron and Coal Co. Ltd. [1940] A.C. 955; [1940] 3 All E.R. 157, H.L.(E.)
The following additional cases were cited in argument:

*930
0 Allen v. Siddons (1932) 25 B.W.C.C. 350, C.A.
0 Craw v. Forrest, 1931 S.C. 634
0 Crook v. Derbyshire Stone Ltd. [1956] 1 W.L.R. 432; [1956] 2 All E.R. 447
0 Kay v. I.T.W. Ltd. [1968] 1 Q.B. 140; [1967] 3 W.L.R. 695; [1967] 3 All E.R. 22, C.A.
0 Lloyd v. Grace, Smith & Co. [1912] A.C. 716 , H.L.(E.)
0 London and North Eastern Railway Co. v. Brentnall [1933] A.C. 489, H.L.(E.)
0 McKean v. Raynor Brothers Ltd. (Nottingham) [1942] 2 All E.R. 650
0 Newton v. Guest, Keen & Nettlefolds Ltd. [1926] W.N. 161; 19 B.W.C.C. 119, H.L.(E.)
0 Paterson v. Costain & Press (Overseas) Ltd. [1979] 2 Lloyd's Rep. 204, C.A.
0 Ramsay v. George Wimpey & Co. Ltd., 1951 S.C. 692 *930
APPEAL from the Court of Appeal.
This was an appeal by the second defendants, Darlington Insulation Co. Ltd., from the judgment
dated 1 December 1987 of the Court of Appeal (Sir John Donaldson M.R., Glidewell L.J. and Sir
Denys Buckley) [1988] I.C.R. 201 allowing an appeal by the plaintiff, Mrs. Mary Smith, widow and
administratrix of the estate of Ronald George Machin deceased, from the decision of Judge Wilson
Mellor Q.C., sitting as a High Court judge. The judge had dismissed the plaintiff's claim for
damages against the second defendants. The Court of Appeal refused leave to appeal.
On 12 April 1988 the Appeal Committee of the House of Lords (Lord Bridge of Harwich, Lord
Ackner and Lord Jauncey of Tullichettle) allowed a petition by the second defendants for leave to
appeal.
The facts are set out in the opinion of Lord Lowry.
Piers Ashworth Q.C. and Peter Bowers for the second defendants. The issues raised by this appeal
are (a) What are the correct principles to be applied in determining whether an employee
travelling to or from work along a public highway is acting in the course of his employment? (b)
Whether the test laid down by the Court of Appeal in Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292 is the
correct test and whether that case was correctly decided. (c) Whether the payment of an agreed
allowance for working exceptional hours and/or for travelling time and/or the payment of travelling
expenses affect the general principles and have the result that an employee travelling home is
deemed to be travelling in the course of his employment whenever and by whatever means he
chooses to make the journey.
Two general principles emerge from the authorities of the 1920s and 1930s: (1) an employee
would be acting in the course of his employment if the activity he was engaged in took place on
the employer's premises which included building sites and (2) the employee would not be acting in
the course of his employment if the activity took place in a public place unless he was under a duty
or obligation to his employer to be at that place which could include a public highway. In Vandyke
v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292 , 305, Lord Denning M.R., having referred to two previous cases, St.
Helens Colliery Co. Ltd. v. Hewitson [1924] A.C. 59 and Weaver v. Tredegar Iron and Coal Co. Ltd.
[1940] A.C. 955 , said that they showed conclusively that when a man is going to or coming from
work, along a public road, as a passenger in a vehicle provided by his employer, he is not then in
the course of his employment - unless he is obliged by the terms of his employment to travel in
that vehicle. It is not enough that he should have the right to travel in the vehicle, or be permitted
to travel in it. He must have an obligation to travel in it otherwise he is not in the course of his
employment.
That is a correct statement of the law and was applied by Eveleigh J. in Nottingham v. Aldridge
[1971] 2 Q.B. 739 . As a matter of public policy the law ought to be certain: see the judgment of
Sachs L.J. in Vandyke at p. 310F. The decisions in the following cases are consistent with the
principle stated above: see Reg. v. Industrial Injury Benefits Tribunal, Ex parte Fieldhouse (1974)
17 K.I.R. 63 ; Paterson v. Costain & Press (Overseas) Ltd. [1979] 2 Lloyd's Rep. 204 ; Nancollas v.
*931 Insurance Officer [1985] 1 All E.R. 833 ; Canadian Pacific Railway Co. v. Lockhart [1942]
A.C. 591 ; Newton v. Guest, Keen & Nettlefolds Ltd. (1926) 19 B.W.C.C. 119 ; Craw v. Forrest,
1931 S.C. 634 ; Allen v. Siddons (1932) 25 B.W.C.C. 350 ; London and North Eastern Railway Co.
v. Brentnall [1933] A.C. 489 and Alderman v. Great Western Railway Co. [1937] A.C. 454 . For a
case going the other way: see Blee v. London and North Eastern Railway Co. [1938] A.C. 126 .
In the present case the Court of Appeal sought to distinguish the case on the ground that in
Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292 the employees were travelling from home to work and not
between two places of work. That is not a valid distinction because it was accepted by the Court of
Appeal that the men were travelling home from work and that their only obligation was to report
for work at Drakelow two days later. The Court of Appeal's decision in this case is inconsistent with
its earlier decision in Vandyke v. Fender and both decisions cannot stand. Vandyke v. Fender was
correctly decided and followed the decision of the House in St. Helens Colliery Co. Ltd. v. Hewitson
[1924] A.C. 59 .
There must be a beginning and an end to a person's "course of employment." In most cases the
only logical termini are the times when he enters and leaves his employer's premises. But if by his
particular contract of employment he is obliged to travel by a particular means or to use a vehicle
in his work he is in the course of his employment when so doing, even on a public highway.
Further, if he clocks on at his employer's premises and is then sent to an outstation to work
(although not required to use any particular form of transport) and returns to his employer's
premises to clock off, and is paid for the whole period between clocking on and clocking off, he
may well be in the course of his employment throughout that period. But where he is required to
work at a distant place over a period of days, weeks or months, during which period he clocks on
and off many times, he cannot be said to be in the course of his employment throughout that
period. He clearly is not when, for example, he is sleeping in a hotel or lodging, or watching a
football match or going to the cinema. In such a case there are many periods of employment
during that period of days, weeks or months. There is no logical reason why travelling (if not
obliged to travel by any particular means) should be regarded as in the course of employment.
It is incorrect and artificial to introduce the concept of a home or main base into the circumstances
of this case. The deceased and Stages were peripatetic laggers working at such sites and on such
contracts as were from time to time available. The work at Drakelow was simply a longer and
larger contract than that at Pembroke, and the fact that they were to return to work at Drakelow
rather than at Pembroke does not and cannot affect the nature of their journey home from
Pembroke.
The payment of the agreed allowance under the national agreement was in respect of executed
performance of the contract of employment for working during Sunday 28 August until 8.30 a.m.
on Monday 29. It is incorrect to attribute or apply the payment of this allowance to payment for
time and services of the deceased or Stages during Monday 29 August (after 8.30 a.m.) or to
regard anything they did during that 8 hour period as being done in the second defendants' time.
The national *932 agreement prohibited the second defendants from imposing any duties on the
deceased or Stages during Monday 29 August. It would therefore be wrong to imply any obligation
or duty to travel in contravention of that term. In any event, the allowance paid under the national
agreement was for "sleeping time." The deceased and Stages would not be in the course of their
employment when sleeping during that time, any more than they would be when sleeping at home
between shifts.
The payment of travelling expenses or travelling allowance does not alter the nature of the journey
between home and place of work: see Netherton v. Coles [1945] 1 All E.R. 227 . A fortiori when
the travelling expenses are paid for another mode of travel (rail). The journey was merely
preparatory to or subsequent upon the performance of work. It is incorrect to equate a travelling
day with a working day, even if the travelling day was paid for as a working day. Clearly it was
not. The payment of travelling time was simply compensation for being unable to work.
Glidewell L.J.'s statement [1988] I.C.R. 201 , 213A that "the employers had authorised Stages to
drive" must have been made per incuriam as he had already, at p. 207C, accepted the judge's
finding, which was clearly right, that "Stages drove his car and neither sought nor received any
authority from the [second] defendants to do so." In any event, even if the second defendants
knew that Stages was driving his car and was carrying the deceased as passenger this could not
amount to authorising him to do so, or to giving the second defendants any right to direct or
control him. Further, it does not follow from the existence of a right on the part of the employers
to direct and control an employee that at all such times the employee is in the course of his
employment. There must be an exercise of that right by the employers. The commonest example
is where an employee is required by the terms of his employment to make himself available at
home or elsewhere for emergency call out. The course of his employment does not commence
until, at earliest, he is called out.
If the decision of the Court of Appeal in this case is upheld it may reduce rather than increase the
protection available to employees travelling in motor vehicles. By section 145(4)(a) of the Road
Traffic Act 1972 compulsory insurance is not required to cover "liability in respect of the death,
arising out of and in the course of his employment, of a person in the employment of a person
insured by the policy or of bodily injury sustained by such a person arising out of and in the course
of his employment." If the user of a motor vehicle is not insured the Motor Insurers' Bureau will
satisfy any judgment obtained against the uninsured motorist - but only in respect of risks
required to be covered. Under section 1 of the Employers' Liability (Compulsory Insurance) Act
1969 every employer carrying on business is required to insure against liability for bodily injury or
disease sustained by his employees arising out of and in the course of his employment. But such
insurance is not required in respect of an employee who is a relative of the employer. Further, just
as some motorists are unlawfully uninsured, some employers are unlawfully uninsured. But there
is no "Employers' Insurance Bureau" or any equivalent safety net to the Motor Insurers' Bureau.
*933
David Stembridge for the plaintiff. The authorities indicate that there is no simple formula which
on application to the facts provides a ready answer to the question. Each case must turn on its
own facts as Sir John Donaldson M.R. indicated in Nancollas v. Insurance Officer [1985] 1 All E.R.
833 , 835B. In the present case both the deceased and Stages were being paid normal wages for
the journey from Burton-on-Trent to Pembroke Power Station and back. They were not paid a
special travelling allowance as suggested by the second defendants. The burden of proving that
any particular part of an employee's journey was outside his course of employment was on the
employer: see Harvey v. R. G. O'Dell Ltd. [1958] 2 Q.B. 78 , 103 per McNair J.
The evidence before the trial judge indicated that the deceased and Stages were under an
obligation to undertake the journey and were being paid for the time the journey occupied. Upon
the evidence and the findings of the trial judge no distinction can be drawn between the journey
from Burton-on-Trent to Pembroke Power Station and the return journey. The journeys to and
from Pembroke Power Station were performed "for the purpose of, and as a means of execution of,
the work which Stages and the deceased were employed to do": see Canadian Pacific Railway Co.
v. Lockhart [1942] A.C. 591 , 600, per Lord Thankerton. The fact that the deceased and Stages
were returning to their homes in Burton-on-Trent and not directly to Drakelow Power Station is
immaterial. In Elleanor v. Cavendish Woodhouse Ltd. [1973] 1 Lloyd's Rep. 313 , the Court of
Appeal held that the defendant was driving in the course of his employment although the journey
in question was from the area where he had been working to his fellow employee's home. In the
present case the fact that the work carried out at Pembroke Power Station took more than one day
is immaterial. The decision of the Court of Appeal in Paterson v. Costain & Press (Overseas) Ltd.
[1979] 2 Lloyd's Rep. 204 provides good support for this view.
The question to be asked of an employee who has sustained injury should be the same as that
asked of an injured claimant under the Workmen's Compensation Acts "did the accident arise out
of and in the course of employment?" In each case the terms of employment must be examined.
The situation was viewed differently under the old master and servant cases which goes back to
the "broad brush approach" taken in Lloyd v. Grace, Smith & Co. [1912] A.C. 716 and the question
asked was simply this, "was the servant employed on the master's business at the time of the
tortious act?" The courts adopted a much stricter approach under Workmen's Compensation Acts
cases: see Kay v. I.T.W. Ltd. [1968] 1 Q.B. 140 and McKean v. Raynor Brothers Ltd. (Nottingham)
[1942] 2 All E.R. 650 .
Of the authorities cited and relied on by the second defendants, Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B.
292 ; Reg. v. Industrial Injury Benefits Tribunal, Ex parte Fieldhouse, 17 K.I.R. 63 ; St. Helens
Colliery Co. Ltd. v. Hewitson [1924] A.C. 59 ; Newton v. Guest, Keen & Nettlefolds Ltd., 19
B.W.C.C. 119 ; Craw v. Forrest, 1931 S.C. 634 ; Allen v. Siddons, 25 B.W.C.C. 350 and Alderman
v. Great Western Railway Co. [1937] A.C. 454 are all distinguishable on their facts. On the other
hand London and North Eastern Railway Co. v. Brentnall [1933] A.C. 489 ; *934 Blee v. London
and North Eastern Railway Co. [1938] A.C. 126 and Weaver v. Tredegar Iron and Coal Co. Ltd.
[1940] A.C. 955 support the plaintiff's case. [Reference was also made to Ramsay v. George
Wimpey & Co. Ltd., 1951 S.C. 692 .]
The decision of the Court of Appeal is correct and should be affirmed.
Ashworth Q.C. replied.
The first defendant did not appear and was not represented.
Their Lordships took time for consideration. 23 February 1989. LORD KEITH OF KINKEL
My Lords, I have had the opportunity of considering in draft the speeches to be delivered by my
noble and learned friends, Lord Goff of Chieveley and Lord Lowry. I agree with them, and for the
reasons they give would dismiss the appeal.
LORD BRANDON OF OAKBROOK.
My Lords, for the reasons given by my noble and learned friends, Lord Goff of Chieveley and Lord
Lowry, I would dismiss the appeal.
LORD GRIFFITHS.
My Lords, I agree that this appeal should be dismissed for the reasons given in the speech of my
noble and learned friends, Lord Goff of Chieveley and Lord Lowry.
LORD GOFF OF CHIEVELEY.
My Lords, Mr. Machin and the first defendant, Mr. Stages, were employed by the second
defendants, Darlington Insulation Co. Ltd. ("the employers"). The employers specialise in the
insulation of pipes, boilers and power stations. Machin and Stages worked for them as laggers at
power stations; they had both worked for the employers in that capacity for many years. In
August 1977, they were members of a group of about 20 laggers, employed by the employers,
working at Drakelow Power Station at Burton-on-Trent. At that time, Machin appears to have been
living in Burton-on-Trent; it is not clear where Stages was living. There was another job to be done
at Pembroke Power Station. Mr. Pye, the employers' contract manager, visited the power station at
Pembroke to assess the job. It was urgent, and had to be completed by 29 August 1977. So it was
decided to withdraw Machin and Stages from Drakelow, to do the job at Pembroke. They went
down to Pembroke on Monday, 22 August, travelling in Stages' car. They started work there on
Tuesday, 23 August; they worked right through the rest of the week and the following weekend,
working long hours, and, by working straight through Sunday and Sunday night, finished the job
by 8.30 a.m. on Monday, 29 August, which was the August bank holiday. Shortly after finishing
work on the Monday morning, they drove back home in Stages' car. On the way there was a
serious accident. Stages' car left the road; it crashed through a brick wall into a field, and both
men were seriously injured. *935 No other vehicle was involved. Stages, the driver, was plainly
at fault. Machin survived the accident, but he died about two years later from lung cancer
unconnected with the accident.
In December 1978, before his death, Machin commenced proceedings against Stages for damages
for his personal injuries arising out of the accident. In the following March, the employers were
joined as second defendants; this was no doubt because Stages proved to be uninsured. Machin
alleged that the employers were vicariously liable for the negligence of Stages. This allegation
raised the crucial question in the case, which was whether, at the time of the accident, Stages was
acting in the course of his employment with the employers.
After Machin's death in August 1979, his widow continued the action on behalf of her husband's
estate. In the action, the employers alleged contributory negligence on the part of Machin, in
allowing himself to be driven by Stages when he knew that he had not had enough sleep. The
action came on for trial in October 1986 before Judge Mellor Q.C., sitting as a High Court judge.
The judge held that Stages (who took no part in the trial) had been negligent, and dismissed the
employers' allegation of contributory negligence against Machin; but he dismissed the action
against the employers on the grounds that Stages was at the relevant time neither acting as agent
for the employers nor in the course of his employment with them. In December 1987, the Court of
Appeal reversed that decision, holding that Stages had been acting in the course of his
employment. It is against that decision that the employers now appeal to your Lordships' House.
The present case can be seen as one of those cases, which have troubled the courts in the past, in
which the question has arisen whether an employee, travelling to or from a place of work, is acting
in the course of his employment. In order to consider the question in the present case, it is
necessary first to examine the facts of the case in a little detail. The full facts are set out in the
speech of my noble and learned friend, Lord Lowry, upon whose account I gratefully rely.
The employers set aside a normal working day (Monday, 22 August) for the two men's journey to
Pembroke; they were paid as for an eight hour day for the journey. In addition, each received the
equivalent of their rail fare as travelling expenses. The employers made no direction as to the
means by which the men travelled. The two men were however expected to start work at 8.00
a.m. on Tuesday, 23 August, and to finish the job by 8.30 a.m. on Monday, 29 August, which, to
their great credit, they did. After that, they were expected to report for work at Drakelow at 8.00
a.m. on Wednesday, 31 August. While they were working at Pembroke, they were paid for the
actual hours worked by them, the usual premium rate being paid for overtime. An allowance was
paid for their lodgings in Pembroke. At the end of the job, they were also paid eight hours'
sleeping time, because they had worked for one day and one night consecutively (on Sunday, 28
August). Although the men were expected to sleep on the next day, Monday, there was no way in
which the employers could compel them to sleep on that day. Since Monday was the August bank
holiday, they were also paid holiday time for that day. Another normal working day (Tuesday, 30
August) *936 was made available for the journey back. The two men were again paid as for an
eight hour day for the journey; they were also given the same allowance for travelling expenses as
on the way out. Once again, it is plain that they could travel by any means they liked; their duty
was to report for work at Drakelow on the Wednesday morning.
I now turn to the applicable principles of law. The fundamental principle is that an employee is
acting in the course of his employment when he is doing what he is employed to do, to which it is
sufficient for present purposes to add - or anything which is reasonably incidental to his
employment. In Canadian Pacific Railway Co. v. Lockhart [1942] A.C. 591 (a case concerned with
vicarious liability), Lord Thankerton said, at p. 600: "In these cases the first consideration is the
ascertainment of what the servant was employed to do." This statement reflects a statement of
principle by Lord Atkinson in an earlier case, St. Helens Colliery Co. Ltd. v. Hewitson [1924] A.C.
59 (a workmen's compensation case) in which he said, at pp. 70-71:
"I myself have been rash enough to suggest a test - namely, that a workman is
acting in the course of his employment when he is engaged 'in doing something he
was employed to do.' Or what is, in other, and I think better words, in effect the
same thing - namely, when he is doing something in discharge of a duty to his
employer, directly or indirectly, imposed upon him by his contract of service. The true
ground upon which the test should be based is a duty to the employer arising out of
the contract of employment, but it is to be borne in mind that the word 'employment'
as here used covers and includes things belonging to or arising out of it."
As usual, it is comparatively easy to state the principle; but it is more difficult to apply it to the
facts of individual cases. Even so, it is important always to keep the principle in mind.
As I have already observed, we are here concerned with a case which may be seen as one of those
cases concerned with travelling to or from work. I have used guarded language in so describing it,
because (as will appear) I do not consider the present case to fall strictly within that category of
case. Even so, it is helpful to use the cases in that category as a starting point. We can begin with
the simple proposition that, in ordinary circumstances, when a man is travelling to or from his
place of work, he is not acting in the course of his employment. So a bank clerk who commutes to
the City of London every day from Sevenoaks, is not acting in the course of his employment when
he walks across London Bridge from the station to his bank in the City. This is because he is not
employed to travel from his home to the bank; he is employed to work at the bank, his place of
work, and so his duty is to arrive there in time for his working day. Nice points can arise about the
precise time, or place, at which he may be held to have arrived at work; but these do not trouble
us in the present case. Likewise, of course, he is not acting in the course of his employment when
he is travelling home after his day's work is over. If however a man is obliged by his employer to
travel to work by means of transport *937 provided by his employer, he may be held to be acting
in the course of his employment when so doing.
These are the normal cases. There are however circumstances in which, when a man is travelling
to (or from) a place where he is doing a job for his employer, he will be held to be acting in the
course of his employment. Some of these are listed by Lord Atkin in Blee v. London and North
Eastern Railway Co. [1938] A.C. 126 , 131-132. So if a man is employed to do jobs for his
employer at various places during the day - such as a man who goes from door to door canvassing
for business or distributes goods to customers, or who services equipment like washing machines
or dishwashers - he will ordinarily be held to be acting in the course of his employment when
travelling from one destination to another, and may also be held to do so when travelling from his
home to his first destination and home again after his last. Again, it has been held that, in certain
circumstances, a man who is called out from his home at night to deal with an emergency may be
acting in the course of his employment when travelling from his home to his place of work to deal
with the emergency: see Blee v. London and North Eastern Railway Co., above. There are many
other cases.
But how do we distinguish the cases in this category in which a man is acting in the course of his
employment from those in which he is not? The answer is, I fear, that everything depends on the
circumstances. As Sir John Donaldson M.R. said in Nancollas v. Insurance Officer [1985] 1 All E.R.
833 , 836, the authorities
"approve an approach which requires the court to have regard to and to weigh in the
balance every factor which can be said in any way to point towards or away from a
finding that the claimant was in the course of his employment. In the context of the
present appeals, there are a number of such factors to which we must have regard,
but none is of itself decisive."
For example, the fact that a man is being paid by his employer in respect of the relevant period of
time is often important, but cannot of itself be decisive. A man is usually paid nowadays during his
holidays; and it often happens that an employer may allow a man to take the afternoon off, or
even a whole day off, without affecting his wages. In such circumstances, he will ordinarily not be
acting in the course of his employment despite the fact that he is being paid. Indeed, any rule that
payment at the relevant time is decisive would be very difficult to apply in the case of a salaried
man. Let me however give an example concerned with travelling to work. Suppose that a man is
applying for a job, and it turns out that he would have a pretty arduous journey between his home
and his new place of work, lasting about an hour each way, which is deterring him from taking the
job. His prospective employer may want to employ him, and may entice him by offering him an
extra hour's pay at each end of the day - say ten hours' pay a day instead of eight. In those
circumstances he would not, I think, be acting in the course of his employment when travelling to
or from work. This is because he would not be employed to make the journey: the extra *938
pay would simply be given to him in recognition of the fact that his journey to and from work was
an arduous one.
That example serves, I think, to point up the two alternative solutions under consideration in the
present case. For to me, the question is this. Was Stages employed to travel to and from
Pembroke? Or was the pay given to him simply in recognition of the fact that he had lost two days'
work at Drakelow because, in order to work at the power station at Pembroke, he would have to
make his own way to Pembroke and back again to the Midlands? If we can solve that problem, we
can answer the question whether Stages was acting in the course of his employment when, worn
out, he crashed his car on the A40 near Llandeilo.
I propose first to consider the problem not in relation to his journey back from Pembroke when the
accident in fact happened, but in relation to his journey out to Pembroke. I shall do so because I
find it easier to consider the problem uncomplicated by the fact that Monday, 29 August, was a
bank holiday or by the fact that Stages was being paid eight hours' sleeping time because he had
worked through the night of Sunday, 28 August - although, as will appear, I consider both facts to
be irrelevant. I should add that Stages' contract of service was not apparently in evidence before
the judge; and so, although that is normally a material document - sometimes a highly material
document - in these cases, your Lordships' House has (like the courts below) to reach a conclusion
unassisted by the terms of the relevant contract.
I approach the matter as follows. I do not regard this case as an ordinary case of travelling to
work. It would be more accurate to describe it as a case where an employee, who has for a short
time to work for his employers at a different place of work some distance away from his usual
place of work, has to move from his ordinary base to a temporary base (here lodgings in
Pembroke) from which he will travel to work at the temporary place of work each day. For the
purpose of moving base, a normal working day was set aside for Stages' journey, for which he was
paid as for an eight hour day. In addition to his day's pay he was given a travel allowance for his
journey, and an allowance for his lodgings at his temporary base in Pembroke. In my opinion, in
all the circumstances of the case, Stages was required by the employers to make this journey, so
as to make himself available to do his work at the Pembroke Power Station, and it would be proper
to describe him as having been employed to do so. The fact that he was not required by his
employer to make the journey by any particular means, nor even required to make it on the
particular working day made available to him, does not detract from the proposition that he was
employed to make the journey. Had Stages wished, he could have driven down on the afternoon of
Sunday, 21 August, and have devoted the Monday to (for example) visiting friends near
Pembroke. In such circumstances it could, I suppose, be said that Stages was not travelling "in his
employers' time." But this would not matter; for the fact remains that the Monday, a normal
working day, was made available for the journey, with full pay for that day to perform a task which
he was required by the employers to perform.
*939
I have it very much in mind that Machin and Stages were described by counsel for the employers
as peripatetic laggers working at such sites as were available. This may well be an accurate
description of their work. If so, their contracts of service may have provided at least an indication
as to how far they would be acting in the course of their employment when changing from one
power station to another. Indeed, accepting the description as correct, it is difficult to know how
much weight to give to it in the absence of their contracts of service. However, the present case
can in any event be differentiated on the basis that it was a departure from the norm in that it was
concerned with a move to a temporary base to deal with an emergency, on the terms I have
described.
I turn to Stages' journey back. Another ordinary working day, Tuesday, 30 August, was made
available for the journey, with the same pay, to enable him to return to his base in the Midlands to
be ready to travel to work on the Wednesday morning. In my opinion, he was employed to make
the journey back, just as he was employed to make the journey out to Pembroke. If he had chosen
to go to sleep on the Monday morning and afternoon for eight hours or so, and then to drive home
on the Monday evening so that he could have Tuesday free (as indeed Mr. Pye expected him to
do), that would not have detracted from the proposition that his journey was in the course of his
employment. For this purpose, it was irrelevant that Monday was a bank holiday. Of course, it was
wrong for him to succumb to the temptation of driving home on the Monday morning, just after he
had completed so long a spell of work; but once again that cannot alter the fact that his journey
was made in the course of his employment.
For these reasons, I would dismiss the appeal.
LORD LOWRY.
My Lords, the plaintiff and respondent is the widow and administratrix of Ronald George Machin
deceased ("the deceased"). He and the first defendant, George Stages, were employed as laggers
by the second defendants and appellants, Darlington Insulation Co. Ltd. ("the employers") and on
29 August 1977, having finished a lagging job at Pembroke Power Station, they were returning to
the Midlands in Stages' motor car when, by reason of Stages' negligent driving, the car left the
road and crashed and both men were seriously injured. The deceased died on 30 August 1979
from lung cancer which was unrelated to the 1977 accident but was caused by asbestosis for which
the employers admitted liability.
On 11 December 1978 the deceased had sued Stages for damages for personal injuries, loss and
damage sustained, as alleged, by reason of Stages' negligence and on 26 March 1979 (no doubt
because Stages proved to be uninsured and the Motor Insurers' Bureau was by then out of reach)
he had joined the employers as defendants under R.S.C. , Ord. 20, r. 1 , alleging that, as the
employers of Stages, they were vicariously liable for his negligence. The plaintiff continued this
action for the benefit of the deceased's estate under the Law Reform (Miscellaneous Proceedings)
Act 1934 and also sued the employers under the Fatal *940 Accidents Acts for damages
occasioned by the deceased's death from lung cancer.
In the first action Stages by his defence denied negligence but did not appear, nor was he
represented, at the trial or subsequently. The employers by their defence and at the trial denied
that the accident to the deceased was caused by Stages' negligence and that either the deceased
or Stages was in the course of his employment at the time of the accident and alleged that the
accident was caused wholly or partly by the negligence of the deceased in travelling with Stages
when the latter, to the knowledge of the deceased, had not had sufficient rest.
Both actions were tried on 7 November 1986 at Birmingham by Judge Wilson Mellor Q.C., sitting
as a High Court judge. In the first action he found Stages to have been negligent and rejected the
allegation of contributory negligence, but gave judgment for the employers against the plaintiff on
the ground that Stages was not the agent of the employers or acting in the course of his
employment at the time of the accident. The judge then assessed the damages in both actions and
stated his reasons on 10 November in a carefully considered judgment.
Your Lordships have no further concern with the Fatal Accidents Acts claim, but the plaintiff
appealed against the judgment in favour of the employers in the first action. They in turn cross-
appealed against the negative finding on contributory negligence. The Court of Appeal (Sir John
Donaldson M.R., Glidewell L.J. and Sir Denys Buckley) [1988] I.C.R. 201 by their judgment on 1
December 1987 allowed the plaintiff's appeal and dismissed the cross-appeal. From that judgment,
in so far as it allowed the plaintiff's appeal, the employers have appealed by leave of this House.
Thus the question whether Stages was acting in the course of his employment when driving his car
at the time of the accident is the sole question for your Lordships to decide. I turn first to the
evidence.
At the trial the plaintiff put in form B.I. 76, a questionnaire relating to an industrial injuries claim
by the deceased, which was issued by the Department of Health and Social Services at Burton-on-
Trent and answered on 16 September 1977 by Mr. William Wilkinson, the office manager of the
employers' Birmingham branch. The form contained the erroneous statement that at the time of
the accident the deceased was travelling from one site to another, but nothing now turns on this.
The plaintiff also relied on interrogatories which had been administered to the employers, but the
information contained in the answers appears from the employers' evidence. The address of the
deceased was given as 4 Short Street, Stapenhill, Burton-on-Trent in the writ of summons when it
was first issued.
As part of their evidence, the employers read a statement which Mr. Wilkinson, who had died in
1983, made to their solicitors in Birmingham in May 1981. It showed that the employers had a
Birmingham branch of which the witness had been the office manager for 31 years and that they
applied insulation to a number of power stations "throughout the Southern area." In August 1977
they had 20 or 30 men engaged at Drakelow Power Station, Burton-on-Trent and also had a
contract to carry out thermal insulation at Pembroke Power Station. Mr. Pye, the *941 contracts
manager, went to Pembroke to price the job and assess the time required. It was urgent and had
to be completed by 8.30 a.m. on 29 August. The deceased and Stages, both experienced men,
were "withdrawn" from Drakelow Power Station and sent to Pembroke Power Station. The
deceased was with the employers for nearly 23 years and Stages for 12. Before they went to
Pembroke they were "instructed by Mr. Pye," who told them what had to be done, when the job
had to be completed and the number of hours involved.
The remainder of the statement reads:
"They travelled down to Pembroke on Monday 22 August 1977 and on that day they
were paid 8 hours' travelling time. They were to be paid 8 hours' travelling time each
way. They were given the equivalent of rail fare each as travelling expenses. No
stipulation was made as to how they travelled. We raised no objection if they
travelled by car. In fact we had no way of knowing how they travelled.
"No stipulation was made when they travelled. They were given 8 hours' travelling on
Monday 22 August 1977 and we expected them to start work at 8.00 a.m. on
Tuesday 23 August 1977.
"They worked from Tuesday 23 August 1977 through to the following Sunday night
and Monday morning. They worked 11 hours on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday,
and 9 hours on Friday, 13 hours on the Saturday and 19 hours on Sunday into
Monday morning. On the Sunday they worked from 8.30 a.m. to 6.30 p.m. and had a
1 hour break in that time for meals. They then recommenced at 9.00 p.m. and
worked until 8.30 a.m. the following morning with a 1½ hour break in that spell.
They were the actual working hours they were paid for. The usual premium rate was
paid on overtime hours.
"At Pembroke Power Station the men clocked in and out but that was for the purpose
of security at the power station. It was not for our purposes. The men could clock in
and rest if they wished. We would not have known of the clocking in and out hours if
it had not been thought necessary to obtain them because of the accident. The men
finished their physical work at 8.30 a.m. That was the time they were paid until. They
clocked out at 8.37 a.m.
"On top of the hours they worked they were paid 8 hours' sleeping time. That was in
accordance with our usual procedures. They were aware of that and had each been
paid that on several occasions before.
"The sleeping time was given because they worked one day and one night
consecutively and it enabled them to rest before making their journey home and be
paid for it. It was accepted that the men required rest before returning home because
they had been deprived of their sleep by virtue of the work done. Although the men
were paid to rest there was no way we could enforce that. They could rest for as long
or as little as they liked without our knowledge.
"Monday 29 August 1977 was a bank holiday. That was the day they were paid
sleeping time. On Tuesday 30 August 1977 they *942 were paid 8 hours' travelling
time. They were expected to return to work at Drakelow Power Station at 8.00 a.m.
on Wednesday 31 August 1977.
"The men did not ask us if they could travel back on the Monday and I would not
have expected them to. We had no jurisdiction over them after they clocked out
because the moneys they were paid after that time were allowances not for the work
done.
"They would have known that if they had asked us if they could travel on the Monday
we would have had to say no. It would not have been unsafe but it was against the
regulations. We would in fact have forbidden them to travel by road without first
having their proper rest.
"The position was that we were not paying them to work but were paying them an
allowance in accordance with rule 3, (overtime) (ii)(e) of the national agreement
between the Thermal Insulation Contractors Association and the General and
Municipal Workers Union and the Transport and General Workers Union."
Only rule 3 (overtime) of the national agreement was in evidence and only rule 3(ii)(e) is
germane to this case:
"Any operative working one day and one night consecutively shall not work for the
ensuing day of 8 hours which shall be paid at plain time rates."
It must perforce be assumed that the national agreement contains nothing about sleeping or
travelling time, pay or allowances which sheds light on the question.
Mr. Pye then gave evidence. He had since 1977 moved to Darlington as technical representative.
Examining him, Mr. Bowers said, "As I understand the position, the men are paid the rail fare
between their home base and wherever they are going to work?" The witness confirmed this and
stated that the men received the fare (in each direction) in cash. He also confirmed that the
employers had no control over how the men travelled to the site, except where company transport
was supplied. He would know how the men travelled, but would not have to give permission. He
added, "I am not concerned how they travel. I am concerned that they get on the job and get it
completed on time." It did not matter, he said, in which direction the men went or how long they
took. I give the next passage verbatim:
"Q. In order to get to Pembroke are they given any time paid? A. Yes, they are paid
travelling time. Q. Is that based on an 8-hour day? A. For Pembroke it was 8 hours'
travelling. Normally it is the travelling time plus time to find accommodation, and we
thought 8 hours is an appropriate time. Q. So they received payment for that? A. Yes.
Q. Did they receive a day off whilst they were being paid that? (Mr. Stembridge: Do
not lead the witness, please.) A. No, no. They don't receive a day off. The day they
are travelling down there they are receiving time. Q. So they are paid a day to
travel? A. Yes. Q. Does it matter if they travel during that day or not? *943 A. No,
they are given time when they should report to the job, and normally they travel the
day previous because they have got to find accommodation as well, you see."
Asked when the two men were expected to report for work again, Mr. Pye said, "At 8.00 a.m.
Wednesday at Drakelow." He had no control from 8.30 a.m. on Monday until then. The employers
had to pay "8 hours' sleeping time" to men who worked a day and a night consecutively, and, in
this case, "8 hours' travelling time" as well. It did not matter to the employers what the men did
between finishing the job and reporting for work on the Wednesday. When asked if he would have
expected the men to travel straight after finishing work, the witness replied, "Not really, no, but I
have got to be truthful; it does go on - or it did go on at that time, you know."
I shall refer to just one passage in Mr. Stembridge's cross-examination:
"Q. You knew they were travelling by motor car? A. Yes. Q. In Mr. Stages' motor car?
A. Yes. Q. You knew that Mr. Machin would be travelling as his passenger? A. Yes. Q.
You or the company was paying them wages during the time they spent travelling
from the Midlands to this power station, and again back from the power station to the
Midlands, were you not? A. Yes."
Mr. Pye also clarified the point that the men (like other employees) received ten and two thirds
hours' pay (time-and-a-third) in respect of Monday 29 August because it was a public holiday, as
well as 8 hours' travelling time in each direction and 8 hours' sleeping time.
The last defence witness was Mr. Bostock. I refer to his cross-examination on the question of
sleeping time:
"Q. They are not doing physical work (we know that), but they were regarded as
being employed by you on that Monday, were they not, and you were paying them?
A. They were using the allowance for sleeping time, yes. Q. It was not an allowance;
it was a wage, was it not? A. It was a wage for sleeping time, yes, which was paid to
them in respect of the 8 hours they would spend sleeping."
I have devoted some time to the evidence because in this case, as in most others, the facts
constitute the essential basis for the legal inquiry into the question at issue. The picture may be
regarded as incomplete, since your Lordships do not know the terms of Stages' contract of service
or the arrangements which the employers may customarily have made with regard to the pay and
allowances of their men when travelling from home or from a place of employment to undertake
various jobs. It is, of course, possible that nothing of consequence has been omitted, but it all too
frequently happens that, only when the legal principles have been analysed in depth, is the
significance recognised of facts which are not in evidence and cannot then be ascertained. In such
a situation it becomes necessary to assume that everything relevant has been *944 ascertained
and to hope that nothing is missing which could have led to a different conclusion.
The trial judge found that the deceased and Stages were employed at Drakelow Power Station and
were sent by Mr. Pye to Pembroke Power Station to do the lagging on a job which he had
assessed. They were paid for a standard 8-hour day for the journey and for the time spent finding
themselves accommodation in Pembroke. The employers knew that the men travelled in Stages'
car but they neither required nor specifically authorised them to do so. Each man was paid the
equivalent of the railway fare and allowed to travel in any way he chose. As a result of working a
whole night the men became entitled to a day's wages for sleeping. They also were entitled to a
day for travelling back to the Midlands. The men were not supervised at Pembroke and there was
no evidence of any instructions being given to them there. He also referred to rule 3(ii)(e) of the
national agreement, cited above.
The employers argued that it necessarily followed from this rule that the men could not be working
when travelling on Monday, because pursuant to the rules Monday was to be the day paid for as
sleeping time. The judge rejected this point but, after summarising the facts, he found "no basis
for the suggestion that Stages drove his car as agent for the defendants."
Then, after reviewing a number of decided cases to which, so far as may be necessary, I shall
return, the trial judge further concluded:
"that the claim by the plaintiff in the first action on the footing that the second
defendants are vicariously liable for the negligence of Stages must fail."
The plaintiff appealed against the decision that Stages was not driving during and in the course of
his employment on the grounds that - (a) the accident occurred during normal working hours at a
time when Stages and the deceased were being paid for their services; (b) the employers knew
that and had approved of the fact that Stages was using his motor car and taking the deceased
with him as a passenger to travel to and from Pembroke Power Station where they were required
to carry out work on behalf of the employers.
The plaintiff also averred that the judge misdirected himself in holding that Stages was not driving
his motor car "incidental to his work as a lagger."
The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, and I now come to the judgment of Glidewell L.J., in
which the other members of the court concurred: [1988] I.C.R. 201 , 203. Glidewell L.J., after
stating the facts, noted the trial judge's first main finding, at p. 207:
"'I find no evidence that those rules were ever brought to the attention of the
deceased, or, indeed, Stages. They seem designed as much for the protection of an
employee as for the protection of the employer. ... I regard the attempt before me to
allocate the Monday as a sleeping day and Tuesday as a travelling day as an ex post
facto rationalisation designed to exonerate the defendants from liability for Stages'
conduct. I conclude that the facts, in summary, *945 were these: the defendants
were aware that the deceased had travelled in Stages' car to Pembroke and would
probably travel back in the same way on the Monday. Having paid each man his
travelling allowance his mode of travel was left by the defendants to his discretion.
The travelling day was paid for as a working day and the defendants were entitled to
direct how the deceased and Stages should act during that day. The defendants,
however, issued no instructions in the manner of travel. Stages drove his car and
neither sought nor received any authority from the defendants to do so. In these
circumstances I can find no basis for the suggestion that Stages drove his own car as
agent for the defendants.'"
He then said:
"I should say that in that passage the judge was finding that what Mr. Wilkinson said
- that the defendants had no control over Stages and Machin during the time between
8.30 on the Monday morning and the time when they were due to arrive at Drakelow
- was inaccurate. If indeed at the relevant times, when they should or might have
been sleeping and were in fact travelling home, these men were acting in the course
of their employment (i.e. both activities took place during the company's time), I
respectfully agree with the judge that the company could have directed the deceased
and Stages and told them how to act. They could have ordered them not to travel,
certainly by car, on the day on which they were being paid for resting. That is
contingent upon both periods, the rest period and the travelling period, being periods
when they were acting or expected to act within the scope of their employment."
He noted without surprise, as I do, that the judge had concluded that Stages was not acting as
the employers' agent; the plaintiff's real case was that Stages was driving the car in the course of
his employment so as to render the employers vicariously liable for his negligence. On that issue
the judge had found against the plaintiff, at pp. 207-208:
"'Nevertheless, he was not paid to drive; he was not instructed or obliged to drive; no
control was exercised or claimed by the defendants as to how he should travel; and
no allowance was paid.' - That last remark is a little difficult to understand in the light
of the evidence. - 'Although these men were travelling by car they were equally
entitled to travel by train or coach or howsoever they pleased. The allowance in
working hours and pay for such hours for travelling does not, in my view, necessarily
bring such travel within the ambit of a man's work. I therefore conclude that the
claim by the plaintiff in the first action on the footing that the second defendants are
vicariously liable for the negligence of Stages must fail.'"
Glidewell L.J. then reviewed that conclusion in the light of a number of authorities which he
summarised to good effect. For the moment I shall be content merely to list them. They were
Canadian Pacific Railway Co. v. Lockhart [1942] A.C. 591 ; Harvey v. R.G. O'Dell Ltd. [1958] 2
Q.B. 78 ; Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292 (in which *946 reference was made to St. Helens
Colliery Co. Ltd. v. Hewitson [1924] A.C. 59 and Weaver v. Tredegar Iron and Coal Co. Ltd. [1940]
A.C. 955 ) and Nottingham v. Aldridge [1971] 2 Q.B. 739 . All these cases had been mentioned by
the trial judge; the Lord Justice cited two more: Elleanor v. Cavendish Woodhouse Ltd. [1973] 1
Lloyd's Rep. 313 and Nancollas v. Insurance Officer [1985] 1 All E.R. 833 . From these cases he
derived four principles which he set out, at p. 211:
"First, where an employee is driving solely between his home and his normal place of
work or vice versa, it may well be that he is not in the course of his employment
unless the test laid down by Lord Denning M.R. in Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B.
292 is satisfied, that is to say that it is an obligation to travel in the way in which he
is travelling.
"Secondly, when he is travelling between two places of work - for example, as here, if
the employee is travelling between a main base and a distant place at which he is
engaged to work temporarily, particularly if the second place is premises not occupied
by the employers but premises at which he is to work, generally the journey will be
within the course of his employment.
"Thirdly, if he makes such a journey - that is to say in the employers' time and in
order to carry out his employment at a place distant from his main base - but for
convenience he actually starts off in the morning from his own home instead of
leaving from his home base, so to speak, or returns in the evening to his own home
rather than going via his base, it may well be that such a journey too will be within
the course of his employment. It is a question of whether, within the contract of his
employment, he was required to make that particular journey, even though the
beginning or end of it may be his home rather than the base.
"Finally, if no other transport is available, and for convenience sake he travels in his
own car and the employers know that and approve of it and permit him to do so - in
other words authorise him to travel by car rather than in some other way - that may
well mean that the journey in his own car will be in the course of his employment."
He then disposed, conclusively in my opinion, of an attempt by the employers' counsel to

distinguish the present case from those in which an employee who had left his base in the morning
and come back the same day had been held to have been travelling in the course of his
employment. This is an unsound distinction: it should not matter whether a travelling salesman,
for example, completes his rounds on one day (or a succession of days on each of which he
returns to base) or stays away for a night or several nights in the course of his peripatetic
employment. and the mere fact that he is not acting in the course of his employment while sitting
in his hotel or lodgings or while going out in the evening does not alter the character of his journey
while he is travelling on his employer's business. Similarly, the plaintiff has no need to show that
the deceased and Stages were in the course of their employment while relaxing at Pembroke
during the evenings of their *947 stay there. They were in the same position there as the ticket
collector in Alderman v. Great Western Railway Co. [1937] A.C. 454 .
The employers argued secondly that on the Monday, "when, according to the evidence, they were
being paid to rest and not to travel", the men were not acting in the course of their employment
and that, if they chose to travel on that day, it was not within the course of their employment.
Glidewell L.J. met that submission (convincingly, in my opinion) with the following observations, at
pp. 212-213:
"The difficulty which faces that argument which to my mind is in the end conclusive -
I must say that it was an argument which greatly attracted me at first - is the finding
of the judge to which I have already referred but to which I return that the travelling
day as paid as a working day and the employers were entitled to direct how the
deceased and Stages should act during that day.
"I have already said that this can only be correct if prima facie Stages' journey, if
made at some other time - for instance, if it had been made on the Tuesday - would
have been in the course of his employment. That is I think what the judge had in
mind. Then the employers would have been entitled to direct that he should not drive
on the Monday. But they did not do so. If it is right that they were entitled to direct
that Stages should not drive on the Monday and should drive on the Tuesday - or
certainly should not travel by car on the Monday because he would be so exhausted -
the fact that the employers did not take the opportunity to give such directions
means in my view that, whenever Stages embarked on the journey back, which itself
was to be made in the employers' time and was regarded as part of Stages' and
Machin's job that week and thus was a part of the course of their employment, that
journey took place during the course of their employment. It was left to them to
decide when to drive to Staffordshire. Whenever they chose to do it, if the employers
did not take the opportunity to direct them, the journey was made during the course
of their employment. Since the employers had authorised Stages to drive, and to
drive Machin, not merely was the journey made during the course of their
employment but Stages was driving in the course of his employment.
"Therefore in my view, based upon the conclusion to which the judge came to which I
have just referred, the eventual conclusion to which he came was, with respect to
him, wrong. I would hold that this journey, on the facts of this particular case, was
made during the course of Stages' employment and thus that the defendants were
vicariously liable for his negligent driving."
At an earlier point in his judgment Glidewell L.J. adverted to a passage in the judgment of Sir
John Donaldson M.R. in Nancollas v. Insurance Officer [1985] 1 All E.R. 833 , 840 in which he
said:
"We cannot overemphasise the importance of looking at the factual picture as a

whole and rejecting any approach based on the fallacious concept that any one factor
is conclusive. The addition or subtraction of one factor in a given situation may well
tip the *948 balance. In another, the addition or subtraction of the same factor may
well make no difference. We appreciate that it would assist if we could lay down rules
or even guidelines. However, there are no rules, other than that which is contained in
the statute: if, looking at the whole factual picture, the claimant suffered the accident
whilst in the course of his employment, he is eligible for benefit, assuming all other
conditions are satisfied. As to guidelines, it would be possible to point to material
factors: was he being paid for what he was doing? Was it the employer's car? If not,
was he paid mileage allowance? Was it of any concern to the employer that he was
where he was? Had he a fixed place of work and was he going to it? Had he more
than one fixed place of work and was he travelling between them? But any such list
would mislead, if, as is almost inevitable, it was once thought to be comprehensive.
We could list factors which are irrelevant, but again any examples would have to be
so extreme as to be unhelpful, because otherwise we might be dismissing a factor
which, in exceptional circumstances which we had not envisaged, might nevertheless
have had some weight."
These observations on the crucial importance of the facts teach a valuable lesson, but I would be
reluctant to see them as indicating that there are no principles in the light of which to resolve the
question your Lordships have had to consider.
The trial judge's conclusion was one of mixed fact and law. Was it susceptible of attack and, if so,
on what grounds? I agree with Glidewell L.J. that the judge was right (or was at least justified) in
regarding "the attempt ... to allocate the Monday as a sleeping day and Tuesday as a travelling
day as an ex post facto rationalisation designed to exonerate the defendants." Once he had got
that length in the plaintiff's favour - with the men having been paid their wages while travelling to
Pembroke and back, it could well be thought that the case had been decided in the plaintiff's
favour. But he found against the plaintiff on the course of employment issue. I am, however,
satisfied that the Court of Appeal was right and I consider that the judge misdirected himself in
point of law by drawing faulty conclusions from cases decided on different facts. In a passage
already quoted above the judge said:
"[1] Nevertheless, he was not paid to drive; [2] he was not instructed or obliged to
drive; [3] no control was exercised or claimed by the defendants as to how he should
travel; [4] and no allowance was paid."
(I have inserted the figures for ease of reference).
My observations are as follows.
(1) This point would be relevant to answer the claim based on agency, but it does not prevent
Stages from having been in the course of his employment; the fact that he was driving is
incidental. The deceased was a passenger but that fact was consistent with the deceased's being in
the course of his employment; both men were employed to go to Pembroke, do the lagging job
and come back. Both their travelling, by *949 car or other means, and their work at Pembroke
were to be paid for by the employers and done in the employers' time.
(2) It was up to the deceased and Stages how they reached Pembroke and how they returned; a
travelling salesman with no special directions or orders as to his mode of transport would have
been in the same position. The question of obligation to use a particular means arises only where
the employee prima facie is not making a paid journey in his employer's time on his employer's
business, for example, when he is going from his home to his main place of work.
(3) In this case the employers had the right of control, although they did not exercise it.
(4) This is wrong; quite apart from the travelling allowance, the important thing is that the men
were paid their wages to travel there and back.
The next sentence in the judgment adds nothing which has not been covered by what I have said:
"Although these men were travelling by car, they were equally entitled to travel by train or coach
or howsoever they pleased." The judge went on:
"The allowance in working hours and pay for such hours for travelling does not, in my
view, necessarily bring such travel within the ambit of a man's work."
Not necessarily, it may be, but the payment of wages makes a prima facie case which is
uncontradicted. It is, moreover, important that the employers (who had 20 or 30 men engaged at
Drakelow) "withdrew" the deceased and Stages from there and "sent them to Pembroke." They
were paid 8 hours' travelling time there and back as well as 8 hours' sleeping time. They were not
regarded as having a day off when travelling but were "receiving time." The employers knew that
they were travelling in Stages' car and were paying their wages during the time spent travelling to
Pembroke and back. All this is taken directly from the employers' evidence.
The first case to which the trial judge looked for assistance was Nottingham v. Aldridge [1971] 2
Q.B. 739 . The plaintiff and the first defendant were apprentices attending a residential training
school as part of their employment with the second defendants. They were returning from a
weekend spent at home in a van driven by the first defendant and owned by his father, when the
plaintiff was injured in an accident caused by the first defendant's negligence. Eveleigh J. held that
the employers were not liable for the driver's negligence because at the relevant time he was not
acting as either their servant or their agent. Although he was given both a mileage and a
passenger allowance and had a duty to present himself at the detached duty place of work, the
first defendant was under no duty to drive himself or the plaintiff there; the mode and time of
travel and the route were at his discretion and the employer had no right of control. Many of these
points coincided with the circumstances of the present case, but in Nottingham v. Aldridge the
occupants of the car were travelling in their own time (that is, unpaid time) and not in the
employers' time and were not on duty but merely returning to duty after a weekend off. The driver
was receiving *950 allowances but neither he nor his passengers were being paid wages to cover
the time of their journey. That case, as well as others, exemplifies the danger of picking out
features and treating them as decisive in a different context. With respect, this is what I think the
trial judge did when he relied on Nottingham v. Aldridge to defeat the plaintiff on the course of
employment issue. The judge further relied on a passage from the judgment of Lord Denning M.R.
in Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292 , 305, which Eveleigh J. had cited in Nottingham v.
Aldridge [1971] 2 Q.B. 739 , 747. Referring to the words "arising out of and in the course of his
employment," the Master of the Rolls said:
"The selfsame words have been used in the Road Traffic Acts 1930 and 1960. They
have also been used in employers' liability policies. In my opinion they should receive
the same interpretation in all three places: for they are all so closely connected that
they ought, as a matter of common sense, to receive the same interpretation in each.
The words were construed and applied in thousands of cases under the Workmen's
Compensation Acts: and I think we should follow those cases. The two leading cases,
most apposite for present purposes, are St. Helens Colliery Co. Ltd. v. Hewitson
[1924] A.C. 59 ; and Weaver v. Tredegar Iron & Coal Co. Ltd. [1940] A.C. 955 . They
show, to my mind quite conclusively, that when a man is going to or coming from
work, along a public road, as a passenger in a vehicle provided by his employer, he is
not then in the course of his employment - unless he is obliged by the terms of his
employment to travel in that vehicle. It is not enough that he should have the right to
travel in the vehicle, or be permitted to travel in it. He must have an obligation to
travel in it. Else he is not in the course of his employment. That distinction must be
maintained: for otherwise there would be no certainty in this branch of the law."
What was here said about the passenger in relation to the course of his employment was also
apposite to the driver, as Eveleigh J. pointed out.
My Lords, let me say at once that I entirely agree with all of Lord Denning M.R.'s general
observations on the consistently continuing meaning of the specified words and also with his
answer to the particular questions which arose for decision in Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B.
292 . Both the plaintiff and Fender (who was driving) were undertaking their customary journey
from their homes to their regular place of work. The employers provided a car and a travelling
allowance, no doubt as an inducement to the men to accept their employment, but the men were
not paid for the time during which they were travelling to work; they were not on duty and not in
the course of their employment. Fender was, however, by virtue of his arrangements with the
employers held to have been their agent, although not acting as their employee, while driving,
with the result that they were liable to the plaintiff but had a right of indemnity against Fender
(which in practice meant the insurers nominated by the Motor Insurers' Bureau). The real contest
was between the M.I.B. and the company insuring the employer's liability risk which would arise
only if the plaintiff, while a passenger in the car, *951 was in the course of his employment.
Accordingly, my Lords, to hold that Vandyke v. Fender is of no help to the appellants does not
weaken its authority in any way.
The judge, rightly observing that "cases where the servant is driving in his own time out of
working hours fall on one side of the line," included among them, as I would, Nottingham v.
Aldridge [1971] 2 Q.B. 739 and Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292 . He then adverted to
Canadian Pacific Railway Co. v. Lockhart [1942] A.C. 591 and Harvey v. R.G. O'Dell Ltd. [1958] 2
Q.B. 78 , which fell on the other side. In Lockhart the railway company employed a handyman
called Stinson whose duties took him away from his base at Toronto to places which could be
reached by rail. He was paid for the time needed to reach those places and was sometimes
instructed or permitted to go by tram, and given a ticket. Men could use their own cars but there
was a strict prohibition against doing this if the cars were not insured. Stinson had already been
reprimanded for disregarding this rule. Despite this, he used his car (other means being available)
while uninsured and negligently injured the plaintiff on the highway. The Privy Council, affirming
the Supreme Court of Canada, which had reversed the trial judge and the Court of Appeal for
Ontario, held that the company was liable for the negligence of Stinson because, although not paid
to drive, he was acting in the course of his employment. It is noteworthy that the only argument
before the Judicial Committee, and the only judicial opinions in the courts below, to the contrary
effect were based on Stinson's disobedience in failing to have his car insured. Lockhart's case is
therefore not only distinguishable from the cases already cited but strongly supportive of the
plaintiff here.
A number of interesting motor insurance questions arose in Harvey v. R.G. O'Dell Ltd. [1958] 2
Q.B. 78 . For present purposes your Lordships are concerned only with whether a workman driving
his own motor cycle combination was acting in the course of his employment when driving a fellow
employee on a 5-mile return journey from a lunch break during which the men had collected tools.
McNair J. held that both when going out to the job in the morning in the employer's paid time and
when returning from the break the workman was acting in the course of his employment and
further stated that he would have so held, even if tools had not been involved. I draw attention to
what he said, at p. 102. The judge here cited that passage, and made no attempt to distinguish
the present case on its facts. Harvey v. R.G. O'Dell Ltd. primarily exemplifies incidental deviation
or interruption. It is also in general terms in favour of the plaintiff in this case and gives no support
to the employers.
The judge also referred to Netherton v. Coles [1945] 1 All E.R. 227 , where the question was
whether a painter who had to work at a hospital was in the course of his employment when
travelling from there to his home. The Court of Appeal, reversing the county court judge decided
against the claimant: by the general rule a workman was not in the course of his employment
between his home and his workplace; the employer had for the time being appointed the hospital
as the workplace *952 and the workman, though paid a travelling allowance equivalent to half-
an-hour's pay per day, received no pay and was regarded as being outside working hours when
coming and going. The general observations of Finlay L.J. are helpful to the plaintiff in the present
case and were cited by the judge without comment.
Glidewell L.J. reviewed the judge's cases (except Netherton v. Coles) and mentioned in addition
Elleanor v. Cavendish Woodhouse Ltd. [1973] 1 Lloyd's Rep. 313 and Nancollas v. Insurance
Officer [1985] 1 All E.R. 833 . In Elleanor the Court of Appeal affirmed Ormrod J.'s finding that a
salesman, who worked during the day at his employer's showroom and who canvassed for orders
with a fellow employee in the evening (while receiving commission on orders, expenses and free
petrol), was acting in the course of his employment while driving the fellow employee to the
latter's home after a canvassing trip. In the course of his judgment Lawton L.J. put the matter with
both wisdom and brevity, at pp. 314-315:
"At one stage of this case it looked as if the court would have to consider and review
a long line of authorities relating to what is meant by the phrase 'in the course of
employment'. Ormrod J. had had to consider some of the authorities and he
described them as 'a nightmare'. Perhaps they are, if one tries to distinguish the very
many reported cases on their facts. But in my judgment it is unnecessary to review
the law in any detail at all, because ever since 1924, the principles applicable in this
class of case have been established by the decision of the House of Lords in St.
Helens Colliery Co. Ltd. v. Hewitson [1924] A.C. 59 . What is required in this case
(and it may be a difficult task) is to apply those principles to the facts of this case as
established by the evidence."
Nancollas's case [1985] 1 All E.R. 833 was concerned with a claim for industrial injury benefit by a
disablement resettlement officer who lived at West Worthing, whose main office was at Worthing
and whose duties took him to other job centres in his area and to the homes of disabled persons.
He adjusted his working hours to the duties he had to perform. One morning he was driving from
home to keep an appointment to see a disabled person in Aldershot, when he was involved in an
accident and injured. The Court of Appeal, reversing the Social Security Commissioners, held that
at the time of the accident the claimant was in the course of his employment. There is an
important passage in Sir John Donaldson M.R.'s judgment, at p. 837:
"The reasoning which led them to reject the claim is long and detailed but the
substance sufficiently appears from what follows in this judgment. The starting point
is a proposition of law which the commissioners derived from the judgment of Lord
Denning M.R. in Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292; [1970] 2 All E.R. 335 that
'The journey to and from work is not a journey in the course of employment unless
the claimant is fulfilling a duty to his employer in undertaking it at the time or in the
manner in which he is doing so,' coupled with references to the St. Helens Colliery
and Weaver cases. With the greatest respect to the commissioners, this discloses
*953 what may be a misreading and certainly a misapplication of the authorities. In
all three cases the employers concerned each had only one regular work place, a
mine or a factory, and the courts proceeded on the basis that the journeys were
between home and the work place. They then considered whether any and, in the St.
Helens and Weaver cases, how much of that journey could properly be said to be in
the course of the employment. In Mr. Nancollas's case, the issue was different. He
had indeed a regular work place in his Worthing office, but on the day in question he
was going somewhere else for the purposes of his work. The issue was whether the
journey was not only in the course of, but part of, his work: whether at the material
time the road was his work place. More specifically, it was whether Mr. Nancollas was
employed, inter alia, to drive to places in his area at which disabled persons could be
interviewed and there interview them or whether he had a number of work places
which he had to reach in order to work at them.
"Mr. Nancollas lived in Worthing. He had his main base office in Worthing. He was
sufficiently senior to decide for himself when and in what manner to travel to
outstations and, if he had set out for Aldershot from his Worthing office instead of
from his home, there can be no doubt that the whole of his journey from that office
would have been undertaken in the course of his employment. It cannot, in principle,
make any difference that, no doubt for sensible reasons such as that there would be
no time to undertake any worthwhile work at the Worthing base office, he drove
straight to Aldershot from his home. This was not a case of a man who one day
worked at a Guildford office, on another at an Aldershot office and on a third at a
Worthing office, travelling by car from home to the relevant 'work place' each day. He
was an itinerant officer who, in the course of his employment, had to roam his area
calling at appropriate offices and, no doubt, private homes to attend case conferences
and to interview disabled people. In driving to Aldershot, Mr. Nancollas was not going
to work. That was part of his work."
The point I would stress before parting with Nancollas's case is that the decisions of the
commissioners which were reversed were founded not on Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292
but on a misreading of that authority. It cannot be supposed that Lord Denning M.R., when he laid
down the general rule about travel between home and place of work, intended to treat as if there
had never existed authorities such as Lockhart'scase [1942] A.C. 591 and Blee's case [1938] A.C.
126 (in which a railway worker was by his contract obliged to turn out from his home in
emergencies and was to be paid from the time he left home in answer to the summons).
The only other case of this kind which I wish to mention is Reg. v. Industrial Injury Benefits
Tribunal, Ex parte Fieldhouse (1974) 17 K.I.R 63 , which culminated in an application for an order
of certiorari and in which a peripatetic petrol station manager who had been injured in a *954
traffic accident while travelling on the direct route between two petrol stations, intending to spend
the night at his home on the way, failed in his claim for industrial injury benefit. Lord Widgery C.J.
stated in his judgment that the claimant was travelling in off duty hours; furthermore, it was
common ground between the parties that the commissioners had not erred in law. Not
surprisingly, the commissioners' finding that the claimant had not been at the material time in the
course of his employment was not disturbed.
Accordingly, in agreement with the Court of Appeal, I conclude that the judge went wrong in the
way I have described. I would add that, in my clear opinion, the decisions which are typified at the
highest level by St. Helens Colliery Co. Ltd. v. Hewitson [1924] A.C. 59 are correct and remain of
binding authority. Parliament has continuously endorsed the effect of those decisions by its
repeated use in various statutes of the phrase "in the course of his employment," and the
application of the principle so clearly enunciated in Barras v. Aberdeen Steam Trawling and Fishing
Co. [1933] A.C. 402 can rarely have been more obviously justified than in relation to those words.
But the facts of each particular case are crucial and new social and economic factors, though not in
any way undermining or detracting from the guiding principles to be deduced from the cases relied
on by the present appellants, have created some new situations to which the older authorities,
though binding as to principle, do not always furnish a cut and dried solution.
In their printed case and before your Lordships the employers described the issues as:
"(a) What are the correct principles to be applied in determining whether an
employee travelling to or from work along a public highway is acting in the course of
his employment? (b) Whether the test laid down by the Court of Appeal in Vandyke v.
Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292 is the correct test, and whether that case was correctly
decided. (c) Whether the payment of an agreed allowance for working exceptional
hours and/or for travelling time and/or the payment of travelling expenses affect the
general principles and have the result that an employee travelling home is deemed to
be travelling in the course of his employment whenever and by whatever means he
chooses to make the journey."
The answer to question (b) is that the test in Vandyke v. Fender is the correct test in situations to
which it applies and that that case was correctly decided. This conclusion, however, does not lead
to the further conclusion that the Court of Appeal went wrong in the case now before your
Lordships. The answer to question (c) is "No," but that question appears to have been designed to
sidestep or to render irrelevant the fact, which was clearly demonstrated by the employers'
evidence, that the men were paid not merely allowances but wages for travelling to Pembroke and
back in their employers' time. My Lords, I am not impressed by the employers' counter-argument
to the effect that the payment (expressly stated by the employers' witnesses to be a payment of
wages) was in reality an allowance in addition to the travelling expenses already allowed, a
recompense to the workmen for *955 missing two days' employment at Drakelow. As to that I
would make two points. There appears to be no justification for thus interpreting what the
employers' witnesses described as wages. Secondly, if there had been any further evidence on this
important issue to contradict or explain the evidence already given, it would have been within the
power of the employers, as well as in their interest, to produce it. A much simpler interpretation,
wholly consistent with the authorities, is that the men, so far from being compensated for not
working, were being paid their wages for performing a duty, that is, for going to Pembroke,
carrying out the lagging job and coming back, as directed.
Again, the employers in their printed case described the deceased and Stages as "peripatetic
laggers working at such sites and on such contracts as were from time to time available,"
suggesting that the work at Drakelow was "simply a longer and larger contract than that at
Pembroke" and that the fact that they were to return to work at Drakelow rather than at Pembroke
"did not and could not affect the nature of their journey home from Pembroke." This concept
seems to me quite inconsistent with arranging to pay the men wages (or even compensation)
when instructing them to stop work at Drakelow, go to Pembroke to carry out an urgent job and
then resume work at Drakelow. As Mr. Wilkinson put it in his statement, the men were "withdrawn
from Drakelow" and "sent to Pembroke." There was no reason why their employment should not
include going to and returning from Pembroke and being treated as on their employers' payroll
while doing so: as Glidewell L.J. put it in the passage from his judgment which I have already cited
[1988] I.C.R. 201 , 212:
"whenever Stages embarked on the journey back, which itself was to be made in the
employers' time and was regarded as part of Stages' and Machin's job that week and
thus was a part of the course of their employment, that journey took place during the
course of their employment."
If the employers cannot succeed, they seek in the alternative as much certainty as the common
law and your Lordship's House can give them in a field which can too easily provide wasteful and
expensive opportunities for conflict between the insurers, on the one hand, of motorists alleged to
have caused damage by negligence and, on the other, of employers who are sought, by reason of
someone's allegedly negligent driving, to be rendered vicariously liable for (and sometimes to) one
of their employees.
The paramount rule is that an employee travelling on the highway will be acting in the course of
his employment if, and only if, he is at the material time going about his employer's business. One
must not confuse the duty to turn up for one's work with the concept of already being "on duty"
while travelling to it.
It is impossible to provide for every eventuality and foolish, without the benefit of argument, to
make the attempt, but some prima facie propositions may be stated with reasonable confidence.
1. An employee travelling from his ordinary residence to his regular place of work, whatever the
means of transport and even if it is *956 provided by the employer, is not on duty and is not
acting in the course of his employment, but, if he is obliged by his contract of service to use the
employer's transport, he will normally, in the absence of an express condition to the contrary, be
regarded as acting in the course of his employment while doing so.
2. Travelling in the employer's time between workplaces (one of which may be the regular
workplace) or in the course of a peripatetic occupation, whether accompanied by goods or tools or
simply in order to reach a succession of workplaces (as an inspector of gas meters might do), will
be in the course of the employment.
3. Receipt of wages (though not receipt of a travelling allowance) will indicate that the employee is
travelling in the employer's time and for his benefit and is acting in the course of his employment,
and in such a case the fact that the employee may have discretion as to the mode and time of
travelling will not take the journey out of the course of his employment.
4. An employee travelling in the employer's time from his ordinary residence to a workplace other
than his regular workplace or in the course of a peripatetic occupation or to the scene of an
emergency (such as a fire, an accident or a mechanical breakdown of plant) will be acting in the
course of his employment.
5. A deviation from or interruption of a journey undertaken in the course of employment (unless

the deviation or interruption is merely incidental to the journey) will for the time being (which may
include an overnight interruption) take the employee out of the course of his employment.
6. Return journeys are to be treated on the same footing as outward journeys.
All the foregoing propositions are subject to any express arrangements between the employer and
the employee or those representing his interests. They are not, I would add, intended to define the
position of salaried employees, with regard to whom the touchstone of payment made in the
employer's time is not generally significant.
In framing these propositions I acknowledge my debt to Glidewell L.J.'s statement of principles in

the Court of Appeal. I would, however, respectfully suggest that some of the conditions laid down
in his fourth principle are a little too restrictive.
My Lords, for the reasons I have already given, I would dismiss this appeal and affirm the order of
the Court of Appeal.
Representation
Solicitors: Turner Kenneth Brown for Jacksons Monk & Rowe, Middlesbrough ; Sharpe Pritchard
for F. A. Greenwood & Co., Birmingham .
Appeal dismissed with costs. (M. F. )
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Status: Positive or Neutral Judicial Treatment

*928 Smith Respondent v Stages and Another Appellants

[1989] 2 W.L.R. 529

[1989] A.C. 928

1988 Oct. 24, 26, 31; Nov. 1; 1989 Feb. 23

Vicarious Liability—Master and servant—Course of employment—Defendant and fellow—employee

On appeal by the employers:-

Vandyke v. Fender [1970] 2 Q.B. 292 , C.A. approved.

Decision of the Court of Appeal [1988] I.C.R. 201 affirmed.

The following cases are referred to in their Lordships' opinions:

The following additional cases were cited in argument:

APPEAL from the Court of Appeal.

The facts are set out in the opinion of Lord Lowry.

The decision of the Court of Appeal is correct and should be affirmed.

Ashworth Q.C. replied.

LORD BRANDON OF OAKBROOK.

LORD GOFF OF CHIEVELEY.

For these reasons, I would dismiss the appeal.

national agreement, cited above.

He then disposed, conclusively in my opinion, of an attempt by the employers' counsel to

"We cannot overemphasise the importance of looking at the factual picture as a

(I have inserted the figures for ease of reference).

My observations are as follows.

5. A deviation from or interruption of a journey undertaken in the course of employment (unless

6. Return journeys are to be treated on the same footing as outward journeys.

In framing these propositions I acknowledge my debt to Glidewell L.J.'s statement of principles in

Appeal dismissed with costs. (M. F. )

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