but, you say, this is a HAVS blog.
True, but generally where there was vibration there was also noise, so not totally off topic
Anyway, on NIHL, and hearing aids - Coffin v Tarrant is useful to counter arguments that hearing aids can be had on the NHS and so defendants won’t pay for them.
Also provides a useful judicial overview of the subject.
There was an interesting case on Limitation in Middlesbrough (High court) recently: Wood v MoD. Unfortunately, it is not available on BAILII, but I have a copy of the judgement if you care to email me.
Nothing new, as such, but a very interesting and useful case on S14.
Claimant had developed parkinson’s, he thought from his exposure to particular substances in his work in the Services. none of his medical advisers at that time were of that view. Legal Aid was refused to enable him to pursue case at that time.
over 10 years later he finds, and obtains evidence to the effect that, he was right.
court found that he didn’t have relevant knowledge for S14 purposes until recently (so he had issued within time). court also held that S33 discretion would have been exercised, had it been necessary, since the defence was well able to defend the claim (all relevant witnesses and documents still available).
There was one new case on limitation, in a HAVS/CTS matter, but the result is not unsurprising
more generally on limitation is the case of Cain v Francis, which will be of particular assistance where there has been an admission prior to issue but issue was after limitation had expired. The two cases in Cain were RTA matters, but well worth reading.
thanks to all who came.
thanks to all the speakers.
St james park does good food….
the first time we’ve every laughed our socks off at a symposium - a mock trial that entertained ANd educated - i always think barristers would be actors in another life…
now the hard work of putting the book together starts….
before the symposium was last night, we’re really happy with the way it’s going and found that virtually everything was done that could be done.
we think it’s the best organised/catered so far, hope you all agree.
we ended up having interesting debates about medical stuff and i said, this is what the forum is for, go use it! some of the organising team haven’t signed into the forum yet, but i hope everyone does soon!
i have at last been able to persuade the forum to show icons such that people can post topics etc - that’s only taken me a month to work out what was going wrong!
any peole intending to book fo rthe symposium last minute should try and make this week their “last minute” as St James wants us to finalise numbers, for catering purposes, and of course we know some of you will be deciding nearer the day whether to come or not…
as we have already been spammed, I have had to set this so that only those registered and logged in can comment, which is a shame. Hopefully I will be able to change that in due course
we’re very pleased with the interest in the Symposium this year and look forward to meeting you all - many haven’t attended previous symposia, so we hope you enjoy it!
3 weeks on Friday, so if you haven’t booked already, please do so now to be assured of a place….
Bookings are coming in for the symposium, so thank you to all for that.
I think the main point of a blog is to consider new matters, and thus generate comment on them. so, for example, I use my personal blog (if anyone’s interested in horses!) to talk about good and bad things that are happening that day with my horse, with occasional diversions into the news or a holiday.
So I see this blog as to reflect anything new that is happening legally, medically or in the engineering field in relation to vibration & HAVS.
given that it is still august, there’s nothing new legally to blog about (unless someone knows different??). there was a recent limitation case (Field v British Coal), but on NIHL rather than HAVS; however, I have no doubt that analogies will be made in future HAVS cases - can a man who has symptoms which he thinks (with reason, as Mr Field had reason) are caused by something other than vibration, be said to have had knowledge at the time he got his symptoms, rather than at the later date when he found out the actual cause?
the earlier limitation case of Furniss v Firth Brown (also NIHL) is also interesting on “significant injury”, and it will be interesting to see how the debate develops in HAVS matters - at what point will an injury be thought to be significant in THIS context
a search in Bailii today confirmed my recollection that the last two HAVS cases to trouble the Court of Appeal were Norton v Corus and Kew v Bettamix, reported, respectively, on the 13th & 14th November 2006.
It will be interesting to see what happens next…
Claire Hodgson
We have our first booking, thank you that man!