Dowse Cases

Injured cyclist recovers £11,000

2012-01-24T10:00:00.000-08:00

Our client was cycling on Hackney Road on September 2010 when she was involved in a road traffic accident. A truck passing on her right hand side knocked her off her bike, pulling her along the ground. She suffered soft tissue injuries and psychological difficulties after the accident. At the time of the accident, she was studying accountancy and was unable to continue her studies as a result of the accident.

We obtained CCTV evidence showing that the driver of the truck did not leave sufficient space between the truck and our client while trying to overtake her. We also obtained a neurologist and psychiatric report outlining in detail our client’s injuries. We argued that the CCTV evidence showed that the truck driver was at fault by getting too close to the bike. The Defendant’s insurers failed to accept liability, and so we prepared court papers and issued the claim in the county court. Soon after, we received an offer from the insurers of £7,000. However, we believed that our client’s injuries and suffering placed her claim at a higher value. We therefore put forward an offer of £11,000 which was accepted.

Our client was delighted with this sum and has helped to put a frightening experience behind her.

Personal injury awards for accidents

2011-03-17T03:12:00.000-07:00

McRedmond v AGS Scaffolding Limited

Mr McRedmond suffered an accident at work on 20.11.2006. He had been dismantling scaffolding on a building site when his right hand was struck by a bracket stuck fast to a pole as he slid it through his hand. Mr McRedmond had not been warned by a work colleague about the bracket still attached to the pole.

The Defendant company denied liability and argued that our client was the author of his own misfortune. Eventually proceedings were issued upon which the Defendant conceded liability. Shortly before trial a Joint Settlement Meeting was held to see if a compromise was possible. As a result compensation of £84,000 was paid.

Mr McRedmond was 64 years old at the time of the accident and but for the accident had intended to continue working as long as he was physically able. Further, as a result of the accident Mr McRedmond required ongoing care and support from his family. Both loss of earnings and the costs of future care were factored into the compensation agreed .

MRS A v London Borough of Redbridge

On Sunday, 20.7.2008 Mrs A was walking along Wanstead High Street when she tripped and fell over a raised paving stone causing her to fall forward and to break her right wrist. Redbridge Council denied liability on the grounds that the pavement had only been inspected within the last couple of months before the accident when the defect had not been recorded. However, we were able to find an independent witness who had tripped at the same spot about 3 months before Mrs A, and furthermore we argued that the inspection regime was inadequate.

We prepared papers to commence court proceedings but before doing so put forward an offer to settle the claim based on a medical report and an assessment of our client’s future care needs (our client was in particular restricted in the contribution she could now make to housework).

Settlement was reached on 31.3.2010 for £40,500.00 the greater part of which related to our client’s future care needs. It is quite possible that this case would have failed but for assertive representation and identifying shortcomings in the Council’s inspection and maintenance procedures for pavements in the borough.

Son wins court battle for father's Council flat

2010-06-16T10:18:00.000-07:00

On 10th June a judge at Clerkenwell & Shoreditch County Court ruled that a son who had lived with his father, and cared for him in the final year of his life, was entitled to take over his father’s tenancy of a one bedroom Council flat.

Hackney argued that the son was not entitled to succeed to the tenancy because he had links to a girlfriend who had a flat elsewhere where he sometimes stayed and which he used as a postal address. But having heard evidence from a friend, and a neighbour, who had regularly visit the father’s flat over the years, the Judge ruled that the son had not lived there simply to care for his father but had made his home there, and not with his girlfriend, for at least the required 12 months up to the date of the father’s death.

The son’s solicitor Bill Parry-Davies, said “It is a great relief to our client that, after further upset when the tenancy was being contested following his father’s death, our client finally can call the flat his own”.

Hackney Council ordered to pay £43,500 compensation to its longsuffering lessee

2010-03-16T05:22:00.000-07:00

Hackney Council has been ordered to pay a lessee £43,500 compensation and her legal costs following years of dampness and disrepair at her maisonette. The Council has also had to apologise to the Court for failing to comply with a Court order to carry out the works.

The Court orders conclude a longstanding dispute which arose when the Council failed to repair the bowing front wall of the building which was left with wooden supports around the windows to prevent collapse.

The lessee’s solicitors, Dowse & Co., first wrote to the Council on 23.4.04 asking for its proposals for repair. Surveyors and structural engineers were appointed who identified the structural works required and agreed a Specification of Works in February 2005. But despite this no works were done. In October 2005 steel acrow props were put in the bedroom to prevent its ceiling collapsing from dampness.

Court proceedings were commenced in October 2005 and the Council defended the case right up until the day of the trial on 15 March 2007. At Court the Council agreed to pay £11,000 compensation, all the legal costs and to carry out all the agreed repairs, at its own expense, by August 2007.

But the Council failed to commence any repairs and so the Court ordered it to complete the work before February 2008 and to pay additional compensation. However by June 2008 structural engineers reported that, although the front wall of the building had by then been rebuilt, extensive repair work still remained incomplete.

The case finally concluded at a Court hearing in July 2009 when the Council had to apologise to the Court that it had been, and still remained, in breach of the Court’s order. The Council agreed to pay the lessee a further sum of £32,500 compensation and her legal costs. Finally in August 2009 the surveyor certified that the all repairs had finally been done and the compensation has now been paid..

The lessee said “ All I ever wanted was for the repairs to be done. I was caused a lot of anxiety and upset by the way the Council treated me and by its delays. And I lost so much money because the maisonette couldn’t be occupied until the work was finished.”

Bill Parry-Davies of Dowse & Co. said “ Landlords have legal duties to repair the structure of its tenants' and lessees' homes. In default the Council had to compensate for all the lessee's distress and her losses, all the legal costs and do all the building works. It could have saved the public over £100,00 by getting on with the repairs when first asked in 2004. It’s a scandalous waste of money which could have been spent on good causes instead.”