On 2007-06-30 00:59:27 +0100, Matty F said:

On Jun 30, 2:11 am, " wrote:

Your issue with Makita seems to be both the quality of the tools and
that they didn't pay adequate compensation in respect to an incident
in NZ.

Some people in here are glowing in their praise of Makita tools. I am
saying that some of those tools have design problems which in some
cases are dangerous and need to be recalled, just like most brands. In
the case of the sander, the part that the sandpaper is attached to
simply fell apart and shot out at high speed. That probably would have
broken safety glasses.

It would not break the type of safety glasses recommended for use with
this type of tool.



The operator was not misusing the tool, it
simply was dangerously defective, and had been recalled in the US six
months earlier than the accident. Not enough effort was made to notify
buyers of the sander in New Zealand.

He was misusing the tool because he was not wearing the correct type of
eye protection. Had he been doing so, the injury would not have
arisen,.




Initially, on the Fair Go TV programme, a Makita executive refused
point blank to offer any compensation whatsoever for the loss of an
eye.

Quite rightly so. The customer had not used the tool in accordance
with the maker's instructions.

Would you expect them to compensate a user of a drill who sits a piece
of wood on his lap and then proceeds to drill into a major artery in
the leg?



As far as the compensation issue goes, there seems to be some aspect
of NZ law that is distinctly different "ACC", that many of the posters
on the original thread referred to - can you explain what this means?

NZ Accident Compensation law means that nobody can be sued for damages
in an accident. There's not time to explain it all here. The State
will compensate for injury. But the State will often prosecute people
who caused an accident and fine them heavily, which did not occur with
Makita.

Clearly the state did not consider that there was a case to answer on
the part of the manufacturer. Had there been one, as you say, there
would have been a prosecution and a heavy fine.

You are confusing misuse of product with product liability and using
emotional arguments to justify an untenable argument.