The Court of Appeal has set aside a near €114,000 compensation sum that was secured by a cyclist who injured himself after crashing off his bike because of damage to the road he was on at the time.
Ed O’Riordan was out on a leisure cycle close to his home
in Shannon, Co Clare, over seven years ago when he crashed badly and injured
his left ankle.
He had sued Clare County Council and Response Engineering
Ltd and in 2019 he was awarded €140,000 in the High Court. The sum was reduced to
€113,404 after Mr O’Riordan was found to be partly responsible for the crash in
August, 2014.
The cattle grid where the crash happened was on the road
to the De Beers factory built by the Shannon Development Authority. However,
the authority’s responsibilities – including for roads – transferred to Clare
County Council in 2004.
Advertisement
The Irish Independent reports that due to the ancient
rule of non-feasance, Mr Justice Seamus Noonan, on behalf of the Court of
Appeal, said the appeal by Clare County Council must be allowed.
Related News
As a result, and "with considerable regret",
the award of €113,404 to Mr O’Riordan was overturned.
The rule of non-feasance effectively means any entity
that assumes responsibility for infrastructure it did not create cannot be held
liable for incidents arising from that infrastructure. It applies to all civil
liability cases.
In the case of Mr O’Riordan, a section of a concrete ramp
overlapping the cattle grid had broken away. This created a one-inch drop, as a
result of which Mr O’Riordan crashed aged 64 years at the time.
While the rule of non-feasance had been abolished in the UK, it was still in place in the Republic.
It this case it meant Clare County Council could not be held liable for an accident arising from a fault in infrastructure dating back to pre-2004 when Shannon Development Authority was responsible for the road as the council did not create the danger.
However, the court sympathised with Mr O'Riordan over his injury and also because his case could not be accommodated due to the position with the law at present in the Republic.
