Lawyer warns of dangers of liquor liability

Lawyer Carmen Place, of Lindsay Kenney warned today’s joint CICMA and CIAA conference about the dangers of ‘the general rule’ regarding liquor liability and the social host.
Place reviewed the Childs v. Desormeaux case and said that even though the judge concluded that ‘the social hosts had no statutory duty to monitor the consumption of alcohol or to control the structure of the atmosphere in which alcohol was served there is no evidence that anyone relied on them to do so.”
The judge added in his findings that, “I conclude that hosting a party at which alcohol is served does not, without more, establish the degree of proximity required to give rise to a duty of care on the hosts to third-party highway users who may be injured by an intoxicated guest. The injury here was not shown to be foreseeable on the facts as found by the trial judge.”
Place commented that even though the Supreme Court of Canada has made clear that duty of care and the ‘social host’ is very limited, he warns that, “the inclusion of the words such as ‘without more’ clearly leave it open to argue that in certain cases a duty of care and liability may be found aginst a ‘social host.'”
Place listed a number of other, different fact situations in which a social host may be found to have a duty of care, including stags, office parties, fundraisers, grad parties where parents are present, birthday parties, funerals or wakes, weddings or receptions.