49 No taking of undue advantage

The rules on benevolent intervention reflect the idea that it would be unfair to allow a person who has been assisted in an emergency by the kindness of a stranger to take advantage of that kindness. The assisted person is therefore obliged to pay at least the necessary expenses incurred. This idea is also at the root of the law on unjustified enrichment. The rules on unjustified enrichment primarily give effect to a deep-rooted principle of justice that one person should not be permitted unfairly to profit at another's expense. Where one person, due to mistake, fraud or some equivalent reason, has conferred a benefit on another which would not have been conferred if the true circumstances had been known and the recipient has no countervailing reason to retain that benefit, other than that they have fortuitously received it, the recipient should not be permitted to retain the benefit to the prejudice of the person who was disadvantaged by conferring it.1.