Edward Ronan v Tipperary County Council
| Jurisdiction | Ireland |
| Judge | Mr. Justice Twomey |
| Judgment Date | 11 June 2021 |
| Neutral Citation | [2021] IEHC 492 |
| Docket Number | [2016 No. 443 P] |
| Year | 2021 |
| Court | High Court |
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[2021] IEHC 492
[2016 No. 443 P]
THE HIGH COURT
JUDGMENT delivered by Mr. Justice Twomey on the 11th day of June, 2021
This is a claim for compensation from a slip and fall against a local authority and a house owner by a gentleman when he was walking onto a foot path.
It considers the important principles in slip and fall claims of:
as set down in by the Court of Appeal in Power v. Waterford City and County Council [2020] IECA 196, Lavin v. Dublin Airport Authority [2016] IECA 268, Byrne v. Ardenheath [2017] IECA 293 and Cekanova v. Dunnes Stores [2021] IECA 12.
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• the obligation of a plaintiff to look where he is going,
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• the duty of a plaintiff to take reasonable care for his own safety, and,
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• the application of common sense to claims for compensation for personal injuries
In this regard, on a superficial or prima facie level, one can always say that an accident would not have happened but for X or Y (in this case the ramp between a footpath and the road). However, as noted by the Court of Appeal in Lavin v. Dublin Airport Authority, this does not make the ramp the ‘legal cause’ of the accident.
Accordingly, perhaps the first question for a lawyer advising plaintiffs in trip and fall cases is whether the plaintiff was looking where he was going and if he was, whether he should have seen the hazard in question. These straightforward questions would, in this Court's view, have led to this claim (and perhaps other similar claims) not being taken and perhaps an easing of the backlog in personal injury claims.
The plaintiff (“Mr. Ronan”) is a gentleman from Tincurry, Cahir, Co. Tipperary and is 63 years old. On the 17th of February, 2015 at approximately 7pm he claims that he injured his lower back when he tripped on a concrete ramp between a road and footpath, when he was visiting his sister at No. 18 Dunesk, Rosemount, Cahir, Co. Tipperary. Mr. Ronan's claim is for damages for fractures to his lower back, which he says he sustained when he fell. He claims, inter alia, that he cannot now sleep because of this back pain which he suffered as a result of this fall.
The defendants deny that there any was any negligence on their part and further claim that Mr. Ronan sustained the fractures to his back when he fell down the steps outside a pub, some five years earlier in 2010.
The ramp, the subject of these proceedings, is five feet in length (on the road parallel to the path) and approximately five inches wide and slopes up from the road to a height of five inches. It leads from the road to the footpath which is itself five inches above the road. In this way this ramp appears to have been constructed to facilitate the mounting of the footpath by a car in order, it would appear, to park at the far side of the footpath in front of the houses that front on to the footpath. The ramp is constructed in front of No. 17 Dunesk, which property is owned by the second named defendant (“Ms. Barrett”), who is the next-door neighbour of Mr. Ronan's sister (“Ms. Ronan”) who lives at No. 18 Dunesk.
Mr. Ronan claims that Ms. Barrett is liable for the damage caused to his lower back as a result of this fall, on the basis, inter alia, that she constructed the ramp to facilitate the parking of her car. She denies this allegation and points to the fact that there is ‘dished area’ (i.e. where the path gently slopes down to the road to facilitate cars entering a driveway) immediately to the left of where the ramp has been constructed, which dished area she says she uses to access the parking area in front of her house. Hence, she claims that she would have no reason to construct such a ramp.
Mr. Ronan also claims that the first named defendant, Tipperary County Council, is liable for breach of duty as it took a long term lease of No. 17 from Ms. Barrett for the purposes of social housing and it owes a duty of care to third parties, such as Mr. Ronan, who might be visiting the estate, in relation to the danger caused by this ramp which is immediately outside a house leased by Tipperary County Council.
Engineering evidence was provided on behalf of Mr. Ronan that the concrete ramp was constructed some time prior to October 2011 and so it was there for several years prior to the accident in 2015. Evidence was also provided that Mr. Ronan visited his sister two or three times a week at around 7 pm, and that he generally approached his sister's house on foot in close proximity to the ramp. Despite this fact, Mr. Ronan claims that the first time that he saw the ramp was the night he fell on it.
However, it is clear to this Court from the ramp's dimensions and the photographic evidence produced that the ramp is a significant piece of concrete and that any person who was looking where he was going could not fail to see it even at night time (and in this regard, there was no evidence to suggest that the housing estate was not well-lit), even if they only walked close to it on one occasion, let alone 2 – 3 times a week.
On the balance of probabilities therefore, this Court concludes that Mr. Ronan was aware of the ramp and that on the night in question, when it would have been dark, he was not paying sufficient attention to his own safety to avoid what he regards as a dangerous hazard and that this was the cause of his fall.
If he had been paying attention, it seems clear to this Court that he would not have tripped on the ramp. In this regard, no evidence was provided that he had slipped on this ramp on any occasions between 2011 and 2015, despite being a regular visitor to his sister's house, nor was any evidence provided of any other members of the public having tripped on this ramp.
Accordingly, it is this Court's view that as regards causation, on the balance of probabilities the legal cause of Mr. Ronan's accident was not the alleged acts or omissions of the defendants, as alleged, but rather it was Mr. Ronan's inattention and lack of care that caused him to fall.
The forgoing conclusion is based on the legal principle that a person who is walking in this country, whether on private property or property owned by State body, such as a local authority, has a duty to look where they are going. See for example the Court of Appeal decision in Power v. Waterford City and County Council [2020] IECA 196 at para. 33 et seq. of the judgment of Binchy J.
It is also based on the legal principle that a person is expected to take reasonable care for her own safety, see for example the Court of Appeal decision in Lavin v. Dublin Airport Authority [2016] IECA 268 at para. 52 of the judgment of Peart J. If Mr. Ronan was looking where he was going, he could not have failed to see this ramp and then he would not have fallen. Therefore the cause of the fall is not any negligence or breach of duty by his sister's neighbour or the local authority, but his own lack of attention. This is not only common sense, but it also clear from the foregoing caselaw.
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