Supreme Court Damages Of £4361 For Carpenter

Press, Volume C, Issue 29466, 18 March 1961, Page 9

Supreme Court Damages Of £4361 For Carpenter

A jury in the Supreme Court yesterday awarded Charles Edward Fagan, aged SC, a carpenter, married with three children. £4361 Os 3d damages for injuries suffered when he fell from the dome of the University of Canterbury’s School of Engineering lecture hall while it was being built in Creyke road in December, 1058. Fagan had claimed £B5OO general and £541 10s 5d special damages from John Calder. Ltd., building contractor, for whom he was working at the time of the accident. The jury, on the issues put, found the defendant company negligent in failing to put any or adequate fender at the place where Fagan fell, and negligent in placing lengths of steel on the scaffolding. The jury also held that the defendant company had failed to comply with the scaffolding regulations by falling to have fender board at this place, and that this failure caused or contributed to the accident ' Fagan was negligent in failing to keep a proper look out. the jury found, and his negligence was 33 1-3 per cent, the cause of the accident. The jury awarded Fagan £6OOO general and £541 10s 5d special damages, reducible by 33 1-3 per cent, for his contributory negligence. Mr Justice Richmond entered judgment for Fagan in the sum of £4361 0s 3d. He reserved leave for the defendant firm to move for judgment to be set aside or for a new trial within 28 days. Mr B. McClelland, with him Mr A. D Holland, appeared for Fagan. Mr C. B. Atkinson represented John Calder, Ltd. Defence Case The defence was that the company had taken a high degree of care, said Mr Atkinson in opening the defence case. The circular dome required scaffolding right round, so that the men working could not go in and out of the building on to the scaffolding as was the normal case. Because of this, a place had to be made on the working platform of the scaffold at one point for the loading of material required by the men. For this reason, one part of the scaffolding had to be obstructed to • some degree. "The defendant company says that it took great care in the safety of its employees. It was required to do so, but there is a limit beyond which a company is not required to go and, in fact, cannot go. There are unfortunate accidents which are not forseeable and the fault of notody, and Fagan’s fall was one of these. There was a stout guard rail round the scaffolding platform, but Fagan, when he tripped over a starter rod. virtually dived headlong underneath the rail. “The defence says that ' Fagan’s fall was caused by . the starter rod, and that the bundle of reinforcing rods on the platform had nothing to do -with it.” Mr Atkinson said that the project manager and the foreman would say that it was necessarv for the reinforcing rods to be on the scaffolding as the job had reached the stage when the rods had to be laid on the wooden scarfing of the dome before the concrete was poured. These ; witnesses would say that a fender board was in position where the reinforcing rods were lying on the platform when they visited the spot half an hour after Fagan had fallen. Regulations The scaffolding regulations required a fender board W’here materials were piled on the platform. The fender board, as shown in the photographs, extended past one end of the reinforcing rods, and

the other end of the rods was prevented from falling by an upright of the guard rail. The regulations did-not require a fender board on a landing stage—and the defendant company said that the place where the rods were lying was a landing stage. There was a jenny wheel for the raising of materials from the ground to the scaffolding at this point. "The defence further says that even if a fender board had been extended past where Fagan fell it would not have stopped his fall. The defence says the regulations require fender boards to prevent materials from falling on workmen below the scaffolding platform, not to prevent workmen from falling off the scaffolding.” Counsel said the defendant company denied it had been negligent in any way, and denied it had committed any breach of the scaffolding regulations. The defence alleged that Fagan was negligent in failing to keep a proper look out. Medical experts would say that Fagan should have an operation to stiffen the joint above his injured heel to stop the pain. The w’itnesses would say that Fagan could then work a 40-hour week in a carpenter's or joiner’s shop.