HOSPITAL EXPENSES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20725, 19 November 1930, Page 13

HOSPITAL EXPENSES.

AWARD AS SPECIAL DAMAGES. PAYMENT MUST BE MADE. PRONOUNCEMENT BY JUDGE. [ry TELECifI APH. —OWN corhespondent. 1 WELLINGTON, Tuesday. A pronouncement of interest in reference to tho payment of hospital expenses by successful litigants was made by Mr. Justice Reed in tho course of a, judgment delivered in tho Supreme Court today, by which a plaintiff was awarded general damages, and, as part of his special damages, £37 16s hospital expenses. "The plaintiff is entitled to recover judgment for this amount, but it has been represented to mo that in a largo number of cases of this nature where the hospital expenses have been awarded as special damages the plaintiff, after collecting, has appropriated tho amount to himself and the hospital has not been paid," said His Honor. "This, of course, is dishonest and might conceivably bring tho defaulter within the criminal law. I think tho public hospitals of tho country are entitled to the protection of the Courts, and I have no doubt that there is jurisdiction to give that protection. "Hospital expenses are only allowed as special damages on the assumption that they havo been paid, or on the implied promise of him who claims them as damage sustained that tliey will be paid. Our Courts are ever vigilant to prevent fraud and it is a fraud to appropriate money to a different purpose than that for which it has been received."

His Honor, in awarding damages, ordered the amount of tho hospital expenses to bo retained until a receipt or order for payment was presented. He added that he did not want it thought that ho had any reason to suspect that tho present suppliant would do anything but honourably pay tho hospital, but His Honor proposed to adopt tho same course in every similar case in the future.