The Practical Lawyer

There has been an important ECJ decision holding that the MIB (in Ireland) is a ‘state emanation’. Previously, it had been held that the MIB was not an emanation of the state and thus not vicariously liable for the government’s failure to ensure the MIB complied with the European Motor Insurance Directives (which require states to set up bodies to compensate uninsured motorists).

OUP has now published the 14th edition of Guidelines for the Assessment of General Damages in Personal Injury Cases.

The CA has held that a district judge was entitled to find a claimant ‘fundamentally dishonest’ despite that term not having been raised by the defendant.

All PI practitioners will be familiar with the SRA’s ‘advice’ on holiday sickness claims. While many will think that the SRA has gone too far with its veiled threats (and its clear determination that solicitors should discourage such claims) it is worth repeating one point in relation to social media evidence. The SRA says (not unreasonably) that it is ‘highly improper advice to clients to delete evidence’.

The Third Parties (Rights against Insurers) Act 2010 introduced a simplified procedure for those claiming against the insurer of an insolvent defendant. Under the 1930 Act a claimant had to (i) obtain judgment against the insured; (ii) then commence separate proceedings against the insurer; (iii) do so without knowing whether the insurer might have any indemnity defences (and without knowing the scope of cover); and (iv) if the defendant was a company, this meant having that dissolved company restored to the register of companies (so as to allow proceedings to be commenced).

Suppose a doctor fails to obtain a patient’s informed consent to an operation; are damages recoverable for that failure to obtain consent (irrespective of any damages for pain, suffering, loss of amenity, and financial losses)?  

Res ipsa loquitor means ‘the thing speaks for itself’. In the PI world it has been applied to a wide range of cases, including objects falling from buildings, malfunctioning machines, collapsing cranes, and stones in buns.

The requirements for res ipsa to apply are:  

Most discrimination claims are heard in the ET (because they arise out of employment situations). But, discrimination claims against service providers, Ls, education establishments and associations are brought in the civil courts (county or High Court).  

Can an RTA insurer avoid liability to a third party because of fraud by the policy holder? The answer is ‘yes’ according to the CA’s interpretation of RTA 1988 in EUI [2012] and Sahin [2016]. In those cases it was held that the compensatory guarantee of RTA 1988 can even be circumvented by contractual exclusions and restrictions in cover.  

The discount rate was set at 2.5% in 2001, and remained at that level until it was lowered to -0.75% in February 2017. Because of complaints by the insurance industry, the Lord Chancellor is to change the approach that is taken when setting the discount rate.