Contributory negligence on the part of the dock owners was also relevant in the decision, and was essential to the outcome, although not central to this case's legal significance.

In an action by Mort's Dock for damages for negligence, it was found as a fact that the defendants did not know and could not reasonably have been expected to know that the oil was capable of being set alight when spread on water.

The Privy Council's advice soundly disapproved the rule established in Re Polemis, as being "out of the current of contemporary thought" and held that to find a party liable for negligence the damage must be reasonably foreseeable.

[1]Up until this time the leading case had been Re Polemis, where the central question was that of the directness of the chain of events between the triggering act being examined for negligence and the result.

There is authority to challenge this view of hindsight; in Page v Smith, Lord Lloyd stated: "In the case of secondary victims, i.e. persons who were not participants in an accident, the defendant will not be liable unless psychiatric injury is foreseeable in a person of normal fortitude and it may be legitimate to use hindsight in order to be able to apply the test of reasonable foreseeability.

"[6] The Lords gave Morts the opportunity to sue in nuisance but there is no record of them testing this action in that tort.