"A man who lost an eye when part of his conservatory fell on him won
compensation today from the neighbour who was helping him put it up.
Raymond James will receive £44,525.32 from uninsured labourer Alan
Butler, who will have to sell his home in order to pay after today's
Appeal Court ruling."

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/a...ing%20Standard
--
Tony Bryer SDA UK 'Software to build on' http://www.sda.co.uk
Free SEDBUK boiler database browser http://www.sda.co.uk/qsedbuk.htm
[Latest version QSEDBUK 1.10 released 4 April 2005]

On 18 May 2005, Tony Bryer wrote

"A man who lost an eye when part of his conservatory fell on him
won compensation today from the neighbour who was helping him put
it up. Raymond James will receive £44,525.32 from uninsured
labourer Alan Butler, who will have to sell his home in order to
pay after today's Appeal Court ruling."

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/a...source=Evening
%20Standard

Interesting. The whole article, though, seems to suggest that the risk
isn't when you're "helping a friend": it's when you're being paid to
by to do a job.

(£300 pounds to "help" put up a conservatory?)

--
Cheers,
Harvey

Tony Bryer wrote:
"A man who lost an eye when part of his conservatory fell on him won
compensation today from the neighbour who was helping him put it up.
Raymond James will receive £44,525.32 from uninsured labourer Alan
Butler, who will have to sell his home in order to pay after today's
Appeal Court ruling."

Sheesh.

No doubt the outcome would have been identical has it been the homeowner
who'd lost his eye as a result of actions deemed to be those of the
labourer?

Also I doubt the fact that money had changed hands made any difference
either?

I'm quite interested in this since on occasions I personally fall into
the above roles of "homeowner" and "labourer" - I've always assumed the
personal liability clause of my home insurance would cover me if I got
sued under these circumstances - isn't that right?

David

On 18 May 2005, Lobster wrote

Tony Bryer wrote:
"A man who lost an eye when part of his conservatory fell on him
won compensation today from the neighbour who was helping him put
it up. Raymond James will receive £44,525.32 from uninsured
labourer Alan Butler, who will have to sell his home in order to
pay after today's Appeal Court ruling."

Sheesh.

No doubt the outcome would have been identical has it been the
homeowner who'd lost his eye as a result of actions deemed to be
those of the labourer?

Also I doubt the fact that money had changed hands made any
difference either?

IANAL, but I figure that's probably central to the decision: whether
the guy realised it or not, payment established a contract, and that in
turn would have established a duty of care, etc. etc.

--
Cheers,
Harvey

Tony Bryer wrote:
"A man who lost an eye when part of his conservatory fell on him
won compensation today from the neighbour who was helping him put
it up. Raymond James will receive £44,525.32 from uninsured
labourer Alan Butler, who will have to sell his home in order to
pay after today's Appeal Court ruling."

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/a...ing%20Standard

But the article makes clear that James had *hired* Butler to assist with
this work, and that the accident occured through gross negligence on
Butler's part. Contractor injured client, end of story.

In article , Steve Walker spam-
writes
Tony Bryer wrote:
"A man who lost an eye when part of his conservatory fell on him
won compensation today from the neighbour who was helping him put
it up. Raymond James will receive £44,525.32 from uninsured
labourer Alan Butler, who will have to sell his home in order to
pay after today's Appeal Court ruling."

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/a...Evening%20Stan
dard

But the article makes clear that James had *hired* Butler to assist with
this work, and that the accident occured through gross negligence on
Butler's part. Contractor injured client, end of story.

or, employer failed to adequately supervise (unskilled) labourer.

--
fred

In article , Steve Walker wrote:
But the article makes clear that James had *hired* Butler to
assist with this work, and that the accident occured through
gross negligence on Butler's part. Contractor injured client,
end of story.

IANAL but ISTM that it's the negligence that gives rise to the
claim and the decision would have been the same if it had just
been a neighbour helping out for free.

--
Tony Bryer SDA UK 'Software to build on' http://www.sda.co.uk
Free SEDBUK boiler database browser
http://www.sda.co.uk/qsedbuk.htm
[Latest version QSEDBUK 1.10 released 4 April 2005]

Tony Bryer wrote:
In article , Steve Walker wrote:
But the article makes clear that James had *hired* Butler to
assist with this work, and that the accident occured through
gross negligence on Butler's part. Contractor injured client,
end of story.

IANAL but ISTM that it's the negligence that gives rise to the
claim and the decision would have been the same if it had just
been a neighbour helping out for free.

Also IANAL, and I agree that a precedent based upon goodwill help between
neighbours would be quite worrying, were it ever to occur.

fred wrote:
In article , Steve Walker spam-
writes

But the article makes clear that James had *hired* Butler to
assist with this work, and that the accident occured through
gross negligence on Butler's part. Contractor injured client,
end of story.

or, employer failed to adequately supervise (unskilled) labourer.

They tried that defence presumably, and the judge soundly rejected it.