NUISANCE AND HUMAN RIGHTS

Marcic v Thames Water Utilities Ltd [2002] EWCA Civ 65 (unreported, 7 February 2002)

In Marcic v Thames Water Utilities Ltd [2002] EWCA Civ 65 (unreported, 7 February 2002), the Court of Appeal allowed the claimant’s appeal from the decision of Judge Richard Havery QC ( [2001] BLR 366) and held the defendant sewerage authority liable in nuisance in respect of flood damage to the claimant’s house. It also held, here affirming the decision of Judge Havery, that the defendant had infringed the claimant’s human rights (albeit that the claimant’s right to damages at common law displaced any right that the claimant would have had to recover damages under the Human Rights Act 1998). The case is a significant one for two principal reasons. The first is that it further witnesses the onward march of the tort of nuisance and the willingness of the courts to use the tort in order to impose positive duties of action upon landowners and statutory undertakers. The second is that it demonstrates the potential reach of human rights law in that it can apparently reach into areas that would, in previous years, have been regarded as the sole domain of private law.