Third Party Risk: Important Judgment

Northern Advocate, 15 July 1938, Page 3

Third Party Risk: Important Judgment

\Per Press Association. Copyright .] CHRISTCHURCH. This Day. Giving judgment for defendant in the suit brought by the South Island Motor Union Mutual Insurance Association against Minsons, Ltd., Arthur William Minscn and Evelyn Constance Minson. to recover £1225 paid to Mi's Rule, who- was injured by a car owned by Minsons. Ltd., and driven by A. W. Minson, Mr Justice Northcroft yesterday discussed at length the duty of a motorist towards the insurance company carrying his third party risk.

, After the accident, in which Mrs Rule was knocked down, said His Honour. Minson typed a memorandum concluding with the words: “I am most anxious to do everything I can. quite apart from the conviction that it was my fault.” Admission of Liability. The first question before the court was whether these words were an admission of liability within the meaning of clause 11 of the Motor Vehicles Insurance Act, which says that the owner shall not, without the consent of the insurance company, “make an}' offer, promise of payment or settlement or any admission of liability.” “An admission of liability is not necessarily the same as a statement by a person that he is to blame for a happening, for the reason that the former must constitute acknowledgment of an obligation to pay damages for the happening.” s*id His Honour. “An accident may be acknowledged as having arisen from the fault of a speaker without his intending to acknowledge an obligation to pay damages, because he may be of the opinion, without expressing it, that the act of some other party—the victim or a third person—may, in the final analysis, have boon the cause of tea damage. Again, a person who confesses fault in having caused an accident, may not intend thereby to acknowledge liability to pay damages, because he may be of the opinion that no damage has been sustained.

“Each statement must be considered in the light of its own circumstances to determine whether it goes beyond a mere expression of wrongdoing and attains to the status cf liability to pay damages.” Too Sweeping. After discussing the purport of Minson s memorandum. His Honour said it could not be that the subsection forbade every statement that could be used in court against its maker. Were this the case, no motorist who believed himself in the wrong could give an honest statement to a police officer making proper and necessary inquiries. unless he had the prior consent of his insurer, lest the statement so given might subsequently become available fn an action for damages arising from the accident. “Indeed,” added His Honour, “this view of restraint upen a motorist would require him to refrain from impulses of courtesy, chivalry, honesty, or even self-defence, lest he should thereby prejudice his insurers.” His Honour said that lie was unable so to regard the intention of the legisature. Minson’s statement, although it was an acknowledgment of fault, did not amount. His Honour held, to an admission of liability within contemplation of the section, and he therefore answered the question fn the negative. lUcanim, of “Owner.” The second qiies.iuu was whether the word "owner ' used in subsections •i and -1 i.:; ihe jViotor Vehicles; insurance (Third ham Riski Act. Ifl2B. included also the i river, who was entitled to iiidfUiiiii ’ under the Act. In this case, -uid .fid Honour, ihc- person who made iho -r h-mcni complained of was not the actual owner, but it was argued ter die plaintiff that the