Employer Liable To Pay Compensation To Worker Who Fell On Car Park Ice
21 I 12 I 09
Leading law firm Hugh
James have reached an out of court settlement with employers whose
failure to grit an icy car park ‘in case they were sued’ led to an
employee fracturing an ankle.
Mr F’s settlement of
£12,500 was agreed some 8 months after the accident which happened
in the cold weather snap of early 2009.
Employed as a car park
attendant by the defendant, Mr F was 64 at the time of his
accident. In what was one of the harshest winters in almost two
decades many employers found their premises affected by snow and
ice on several occasions last winter.
Despite concerns being
raised by workers and customers that a failure to grit the car park
would lead to accidents, Mr F’s employer had wrongly suggested that
to put grit down would be to assume responsibility for anyone that
was injured and would be to invite claims, whereas to leave the car
park untreated would allow it to deny any liability or
responsibility since any accident would have been caused by an act
of God.
Inevitably workers did
fall on the ice and Mr F was unfortunate to suffer a fractured
ankle which required operative treatment at hospital. Mr F was
unable to work for a substantial period of time while he
recovered.
Partner and head of
personal injury litigation at Hugh James, Jonathan Rees, said: “The
short sightedness of this employer is surprising but not unheard
of. Many employers fail to grasp how to assess risk properly and
many do not understand where their responsibilities and duties
begin and end. To bury your head in the sand is clearly a costly
and risky strategy. Had the employer taken proper account of its
responsibilities to employees and visitors to its premises it would
not have found itself with an employee unable to work for several
months and would have avoided having to pay compensation, legal
costs and medical costs incurred by the treating hospital.”
In Mr F’s case the key
obligation in issue was the employer’s duty to take reasonable
measures to keep traffic routes clear from obstructions which may
cause a person to fall.
Local authorities have
already stocked up on salt to grit roads when the first snow and
ice arrives this winter. Employers and others with responsibility
for seeing employees and visitors are safe when on their premises
would do well to take similar are steps.
