De minimus

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Hello. I'm Robin and welcome to TransLegal's Lesson of the Week.

Today we're going to talk about the Latin expression de minimus, which refers to an amount that is small enough to be ignored. It's too unimportant or small to be taken seriously.

The expression is short for the Latin phrase de minimus non curat lex meaning that the law does not care about insignificant or trifling matters. This is known as the de minimus doctrine.

We often see this phrase in the following contexts, for instance in the sentence de minimus claims below ₤20,000 are excluded under the agreement. We hear about de minimus costs, de minimus risks, de minimus regulatory exceptions and we even have the de minimus defence which is part of the criminal law.

In the state of Hawaii, among others, for instance courts may dismiss de minimus infractions of the law where a defendant's conduct was too trivial to warrant a conviction and this is what's known as the de minimus defence.

I will keep today's lesson short and de minimus and thereby I will thank you now.

Thanks for listening and please leave any comments in the box below.