Madden v Irish Turf Club

• Jurisdiction: Ireland
• Judge: O'Flaherty J.
• Judgment Date: 17 February 1997
• Neutral Citation: [1997] IESC 1
• Docket Number: [S.C. No. 140 of 1993],(140/93)
• Court: Supreme Court
• Date: 17 February 1997

[1997] IESC 1

THE SUPREME COURT

O'Flaherty J.,

Blayney J.,

Murphy J.,

(140/93)

MADDEN v. IRISH TURF CLUB

AN CH ÚIRT UACHTARACH

BETWEEN

ANDREW MADDEN

Plaintiff/Respondent

.V.

THE IRISH TURF CLUB, THE IRISH NATIONAL HUNT STEEPLE CHASE COMMITTEE, CAHIR O'SULLIVAN AND JOHN HARVEY

Defendants/Appellants

Citations:

RULES OF RACING & IRISH NATIONAL HUNT STEEPLE CHASE RULES (1989) RULE 79(v)

WARD V MCMASTER 1988 IR 337 1989 ILRM 400

SUNDERLAND V LOUTH CO COUNCIL 1990 ILRM 658

MCMAHON V IRELAND & ORS 1988 ILRM 610

MCNAMARA V ELECTRICITY SUPPLY BOARD (ESB) 1975 IR 226

PURTILL V ATHLONE URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL 1968 IR 205

HOUSING ACT 1966

LOCAL GOVT (PLANNING & DEVELOPMENT) ACT 1963

CONVERY V DUBLIN CO COUNCIL UNREP SUPREME 12.11.96

YEUN KUN YEU & ORS V AG OF HONG KONG 1987 3 WLR 776

ULTRAMARES CORPORATION V TOUCHE 1931 255 NY 170

DONOGHUE V STEVENSON 1932 AC 562

Synopsis:

Negligence

Appeal - horse races - betting - winner of horserace not qualified to run in race - horse disqualified - plaintiff lost bet - defendant's function to ensure horses qualified for race - regulation and control of horse races - whether duty of care owed - contractual relationship with tote - proximity of parties - rules - public policy considerations - Held: Appeal allowed - betting aspect separate from defendants essential function - contractual relationship with third party prevents duty of care arising with defendants - policy argument not necessary for decision - (Supreme Court: O'Flaherty J., Blayney J., Murphy J. 17/02/1997) [1997] 2 IR 184 - [1997] 2 ILRM 148

|Madden v. The Irish Turf Club & Ors.|

1 Judgement delivered on the 17th day of February, 1997 , by O'Flaherty J.

2 This is an appeal brought by the defendants from the judgment and order of the High Court (Morris J.) of the 2nd April, 1993 awarding the plaintiff £18,930.80 damages as a result of the defendants" alleged negligence.

Background

3 The plaintiff is a solicitor by profession. He is also a keen racegoer. On the 12th January, 1989, he went to a race meeting at Punchestown. The races that day were over jumps, with the exception of the sixth and last race on the card which was a race run on the flat under national hunt rules. All the races that day were under the Rules as contained in a book entitled "Rules of Racing and Irish National Hunt Steeple Chase Rules", the edition which was relevant to this case in dated 1989, and reference to "rules" in this judgment are to the rules as contained in that edition. The first and second defendants are respectively concerned with the management of flat and national hunt racing in this country. The remaining defendants are officers of the defendants.

The Races and the Tote

4 The Racing Board controls the tote. The tote management provided for a jackpot on the occasion in question. A jackpot bet is a pool bet on four races. The punter decides which horses to bet on and then buys a ticket to cover the horses; a selection is made in four races and, seemingly, these are always the third, fourth, fifth and sixth races on the card. The plaintiff entered for the jackpot and duly selected the winning horse in the third, fourth and fifth races and for the sixth race he selected a horse named Lucky Bucket. The race was won by Dell of Gold. Lucky Bucket came second.

5 The plaintiff testified at trial that he was a serious follower of form. He knew that Dell of Gold had run in jump races and had not shown a lot of form. He did not know that the horse had run in England, at Wolverhampton and Rippon. So, he was not disposed to nominate this horse as a potential winner of the race in question.

Winner Not Qualified

6 Dell of Gold was not qualified to run in the race. This is because of Rule 79(v) of the Rules which provides:-

"No horse shall be qualified to start for an Irish National Hunt flat race which has run in a flat race as a two years old or three years old or in a hurdle race at three years old."

7 Dell of Gold had run on the flat as a two years old in England and that had disqualified it under Rule 79(v) of the Rules.

8 The defendants found out that the horse had not been qualified to race and so it was disqualified on the 27th January, 1993, and Lucky Bucket was declared the winner. It appears that Lucky Bucket had beaten the third horse home by five lengths.

9 The totalisator betting conditions provided at par. 37(2) as follows:-

10 The result of any race shall be deemed to be the result as determined under the rules governing racing at the "All right" and no subsequent event shall have any effect whatsoever and when the manager has ordered the winnings or refunds to be paid, no backer of any other horse in that race, or of any combination containing any other horse in that race, shall be entitled to receive winnings or refunds on that race notwithstanding that by a decision of the stewards or the racing authority or otherwise the race is declared void or any horse shall be declared to be the winner or to have been placed in that particular race instead of the horses declared at the "All right" to be the winter or to have been placed or whatever may afterwards result, any rule of law of rule of racing of any nature or kind to the contrary notwithstanding.

11 The term "All right" is defined in the conditions to mean the time at which the stewards authorise the appropriate signal to be given indicating that the riders in a race have weighed-in to the satisfaction of the clerk of the scales in accordance with the rules governing the race, irrespective of whether the signal is in fact given.

12 So, as far as the tote management was concerned, the winner of the race was and would always be deemed to be Dell of Gold,notwithstanding subsequent events.

Defendants" Function and Obligation

13 It is part of the defendants" function and obligation to make sure that horses that are not qualified do not enter races for which they are not qualified. While there seems to have been an extensive debate at the court of trial as to whether it would be expecting too much of the defendants to have picked up the fact that this horse was not qualified that submission, having been rejected by the trial judge, was not pursued before us to any degree. It appears that only about 150 horses (not 190 as stated in the High Court judgment) come from England each year. On the other hand, there is no doubt that since racing is such a world-wide sport and business nowadays, and horses are shipped from one end of the globe to the other, an argument based on hardship of performance might be sustainable if we were concerned with a horse brought from far away, but it is sufficient to say that issue was not raised for resolution as far as this case is concerned.

Is there a Duty of Care?

14 Instead, Mr. Feeney, S.C., for the defendants taken a more pre-emptive position: which is to submit that in the circumstances of this case there was no duty of care owed by the defendants to the plaintiff. He rests this on two bases. He submits, in the first instance, that the frame, so to speak, in which the plaintiff was operating was that he had a contractual relationship with the tote management. The plaintiff knew the number of horses that were in the particular race; he had a choice as to which horses he would nominate; he knew the rule that once the "All right" was given then that was to be the result for all time as between the tote management and himself - no matter what was uncovered afterwards. Further, he submits that there was not such a relationship of neigbourlines between the parties as to give rise to a duty of care. In this regard he referred us to two decision of this Court Ward .v. McMaster ...