A recent decision from the Sheriff Court in Aberdeen has once again confirmed that where an accident takes place as a result of a collision between a motor vehicle and an item of livestock which has strayed onto a public road, the Pursuer will have his work cut out to convince a court that he is entitled to damages from the owner of the animal.
In the recent case of Michael Davidson v John McIrvine, Aberdeen Sheriff Court , 19 February 2007, the Pursuer was driving his car on the A97 near the Defender’s farm. It was around 5.30pm on a January evening and accordingly was dark. The Pursuer negotiated a left hand bend at the top of an incline and came to be faced with a bull owned by the Defender, standing in the middle of the road. He was unable to avoid colliding with the animal and as a result the Pursuer sustained injury.
The Pursuer raised a claim for damages claiming the Defender was at fault at common law as he had allowed the bull to escape from the barn within which it was contained. The Pursuer went on to say it was reasonably foreseeable that if the bull escaped, it would end up on the road.
The Defender’s position was that the Pursuer had failed to establish that the Defender had not taken reasonable care and that in any event it was not reasonably foreseeable that the accident which did happen would occur.
The bull had been contained within a barn. It escaped by bursting through the gate to the barn and thereafter travelled 500 yards to the road, jumping three fences as it did so. In clearing the final fence the animal also negotiated an 8ft drop to the road surface. There had been no previous escapes from the barn and there were no gaps in the fences between the barn and the field.
The Sheriff rejected the Pursuer’s contention that it was indicative of common law negligence that the bull had managed to escape. Whilst the Defender may have been open to criticism for the bull having managed to escape, that was not enough to create a breach of common law duty. It was not reasonably foreseeable that the bull would escape to the road and collide with the Pursuer’s car.
Essentially the key point to remember here is that there are three elements to a common law claim:
- Did the Defender owe the Pursuer a Duty of Care?
- Was that duty breached?
- Was the accident a reasonably foreseeable consequence of that breach?
Unless all of these elements are satisfied, the Pursuer is unlikely to succeed with his claim.
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Bill Speirs
(Information posted in July 2007 and may not have been updated at time of reading).