Private Law Theory

In Hopcraft v Close Brothers Ltd [2025] UKSC 33; [2025] 3 WLR 423 the Supreme Court held that English law recognised a tort of bribery and that it was committed only where the recipient of the payment or other inducement owed the claimant a fiduciary duty. The court also considered that the tort’s existence could be traced for more than a century. In circumstances where none of the great 20th century works on English tort law makes any mention of such a freestanding wrong, the court’s historical assessment, if not its decision to recognise the tort, may come as a surprise to torts scholars …

€ (Westlaw)

James Goukamp, ‘The tort of bribery’ (2026) 142 Law Quarterly Review 169-174.