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Duty of care for people carrying out fundraising
Rank: New forum user 
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I wondered if anyone had experience from a charity who is asking individuals to volunteer / fundraise? Is there a duty of care? How would you risk assess the fundraisers activity? Its not necessarily the 'charity' who is arranging the activity, therefore not directly their undertaking.....
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Rank: Forum user
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Hi AlHo,
Yes there is definately a duty of care here, normally the charity involved would identify a competent external organisation to organise any fundraising activity that involved significant risk and then review their (the competent organisers) competency qualification and risk assessments for the said activity re suitability and sufficiency, hope this helps.
Pete,
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Rank: Super forum user
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I'm with PeteL on this... and a lot depends upon the nature of the activity.
Will the volunteers be marshalling a long distance endurance walk or taking part in a fun day? There has been chat on this forum about forseeability of risk so perhaps good to know that:
People (two that know of) have sued for being rendered paraplegic from diving into shallow paddling pools during "fun days"
Soldiers have died whilst undergoing training the Brecon Beacons
An employee sued their employer for injuries in an off road cycle "competition" during an employee "away day" that was beign run by an organiser of such activities
The list is goes on... there is a duty of care that can be (partly) discharged by careful selection of the "provider/organiser".
Phil
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Rank: Super forum user
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What relevance does the deaths of the 2 soldiers have to this question.
They were not at a charity event/fundraising etc - they were 'at work'. All be it a very specialised form of training etc.
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Rank: Super forum user
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JJ,
The point I was making - obviously not clearly enough - was that all sorts of events can lead to injury. One may not immediately link a 5km charity walk along a river bank or round a park with a "risk". But people undertake the National 3 Peaks challenge - for charity - in addition to other less strenous walks/climbs. Potential risks need to be idneitifed and assessed.
Perhaps I should have used this example: a young girl died on the Ten tors - was that a preventable death? Who knows? It was the first ever death but during the event that year 26 other participants had to be airlfitd to safety. Ultimately it was decided that there was insufficient evidence for any criminal responsbility. I'm all for preparing people for life, exposing youngsters to risk etc but there has to be an element of control.
Phil
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Rank: Super forum user 
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I have always considered that the DOC is very broad and wide ranging; in effect that we all owe a duty to all others (who may be affected by our actions/inactions) subject to the test of foreseeability (remember the pregnant fishwife?!). So in that respect, I would suggest that a DOC is likely to be owed.
To what extent is the duty owed or how far the person has to go to exercise that duty is another matter, and this is as always dependant on the circumstances.
There isn’t really enough information provided to be enable (me) to make any particularly helpful suggestions other than to look at the circumstances and decide how the risk might best be managed. Overall I would say that the ‘test’ is one of ‘control’ (what, where, when, who). If the charity have ‘control’ then they have the bulk of the responsibility, but if ‘control’ rests elsewhere, e.g. a self-employed fund raiser, then I suggest that the bulk of the responsibility would rest with them.
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Rank: Super forum user 
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In Tort law a DoC is very narrow duty excpet where it is enshrined in case law - like one road user has a duty of care to another road user. Where there is not a prescribed DoC, the Judge will decide whether a DoC is owed based on the circumstances as outlined in Caparo Industries plc v Dickman [1990] UKHL 2 three part test below.
1. Harm must be a "reasonably foreseeable" result of the defendant's conduct;
2. A relationship of "proximity" between the defendant and the claimant;
3. It must be "fair, just and reasonable" to impose liability.
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Rank: Super forum user
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Should have mentioned that you may be getting your civil law and criminal law muddled. Risk assessment is mandated by legislation (MHSWR - Reg3) and nothing to do with a Duty of Care. I would also like to add that charities are sometimes not employers, volunteers are not employees, so most legislation does not apply to charitable work. But...there is always a but, I would advise that charities treat volunteers as employees, partly because of the nebulous distinction in law. In that way charities will insulate themselves from both civil and criminal law, as well as adopting the moral highground. See links below for further advice. http://www.hse.gov.uk/event-safety/volunteers.htmhttp://www.hse.gov.uk/contact/faqs/charities.htmhttp://www.hse.gov.uk/voluntary/
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