Defences

Abstract

A plaintiff may be precluded absolutely from recovering damages for loss caused by someone else’s carelessness on the grounds that she voluntarily assumed the risk of being injured in that way. This can mean either that she agreed in advance to give up any claim for compensation or that her conduct was so unreasonable that it would be wrong to allow her to recover (if you play with fire, you cannot complain if you get your fingers burnt). The next two sections of this chapter accordingly consider voluntary assumption of risk by agreement and voluntary assumption of risk by conduct in turn (12.2–3).