ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses some of the threads relating to fiduciary responsibility. The reason for this mooted expansion of the category is that the remedies available to the beneficiaries of fiduciary relationships are more wide-ranging than the remedies generally available for tort law or contract law claims. In an insightful survey of this area, Kennedy sets out those common law jurisdictions in North America which accept that the doctor-patient relationship is a fiduciary relationship in some circumstances. Professor Hayton does end his essay on a forward-looking note by suggesting that 'the survival of the fittest' mentality of the common law is appropriate for a capitalist society dedicated to economic efficiency but in today's more caring and European-law-influenced times such mentality needs to change'. While the Human Rights Act 1998 did not include the usual commitment under the European Convention on Human Rights to ensure that domestic law provides protection for all rights contained in the Convention.
