Personal injuries - Trip and fall - Damages - Breach of duty of care - Occupiers Liability Act 1995 - Balance of probability test - Child trespasser

Facts: The plaintiff filed a personal injuries summons against the defendants for sustaining personal injury. The plaintiff alleged that the defendants had breached their duty of care by failing to prevent the hazard posed by the kerbing stone in the garden on which the plaintiff had fallen. The defendants contended that the plaintiff was a trespasser and that no hazard was posed by the kerbing stone and, in this case, the accident was not foreseeable.

Held: Mr. Justice Hanna dismissed the plaintiff’s claim. The Court held that the kerbing stone in the circumstances of this case did not amount to A hazard. The Court observed that the accident, as described, was not consistent with the injury to the plaintiff’s right leg, and in the surgeon’s  opinion, it would have been a bruise instead of the cut that occurred. The Court also held that because of the different versions of the accident given in evidence, it was not clear as to how the accident actually happened. The Court observed that the duty of an occupier in the circumstances was not intentionally to injure the trespassers and that the defendants did their best to secure the premises, and imposing any greater duty on the defendants would be to put an unnecessary obligation on a public authority.

Ward, Michael (A Minor) v Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland and Ors

10/5/2017 No.  2014/2111 P [2017] IEHC 336