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AQA unit 4C Law- Fault

I have been looking through my study notes and hand out for fault but for the life of me cannot get my head around the damn thing at all. I know that fault aims at looking at how liability is determined in a civil and criminal context (I think) but cannot understand the rest. Can someone please rescue me from this disaster and give me a brief overview of this essay topic please. Many thanks to those heroes who help :smile:
Original post by LookBeth
I have been looking through my study notes and hand out for fault but for the life of me cannot get my head around the damn thing at all. I know that fault aims at looking at how liability is determined in a civil and criminal context (I think) but cannot understand the rest. Can someone please rescue me from this disaster and give me a brief overview of this essay topic please. Many thanks to those heroes who help :smile:


I've got the exact same problem, just struggling with both the essay questions. This is what I remember from fault. Usually the question will ask if law reflects fault or if it should, so you'd want to answer three questions:
- Where does law reflect fault?
. M/R reflects fault, the higher the intention, the higher the sentence. ie: S20/18, D who has direct intention to cause GBH/wound can be given up to life imprisonment , whereas D who intents some harm (S20) can only sentenced max 5 years. Thus reflecting fault.
- Where does law not reflect fault?
. Strict liability, absolute liability, omissions and state of affairs. State the principle, Strict liability offences are those which negate the need for D to have the MR. D must simply do the guilty act to be liable. Use case such as Sweet v Parsley. Clearly not reflecting fault as D does not intend, or can even be completely oblivious to his crime.
- Should it reflect fault?
. Yes, it is unjust, perverse and wrongful for law not to judge on culpability
. No, protects public and promotes high standard of care.

I'm going to be A LOT of revision on this weekend as we've only gone over each topic in our initial lesson when it the content was taught, and what above would probably not even warrant enough for an U.

If you find anything useful, let me know!
Reply 2
two words- god send

thanks a million, it now actually makes sense! :smile:

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