PS> On a more serious note can you or someone explain to me the meaning of
PS> "vicarious liability" as used in the Workplace Health and
Safety Act?

The short story is that with normal liability, its your actions
or whatever that bring you undone and make you liable. Vicarious
liability is the more subtle stuff, say you end up in the shit
liability wise because of something one of your employees does
without you even realising that that makes you liable.

The most obvious example is where you are liable coz you dont stop
people smoking in your workplace, and that gives someone ELSE lung
cancer because you didnt stop that smoking there. That assuming for
the sake of argument that its possible to get lung cancer by just
breathing air in a workplace with some smokers in it.

PS> I don't want to go into great details why,  suffice to say that I
PS> am not too certain of the correct interpretation of the meaning.
PS> My educated guess is that since the employer has a "Duty of Care"
PS> responsibility than should an employee even though negligently caused
PS> an accident involving a third party is not legally responsible for that
PS> accident and the employer becomes liable for damages.  How close am I?

Yes, in that case the employer can indeed be liable. *BUT* you got
the bit about the liability of the causer of the accident a bit garbled.
It may well be that BOTH are liable in some circumstances. Corse in
many cases it may be considered that its much more fruitful to sue the
employer, particularly when he is fully insured against that claim and
its the insurance company that has to cough up, and not worth pursuing
the other person, coz he may not have many assets and may not be worth
bothering with if you are likely to not even get your costs back.

--- PQWK202