WRULD Claims heard in Courts in England, Scotland and Wales

Hearing(s) - Lambeth - v - Bournemouth & Swanage Motor Road & Ferry Co

Date	Court	Claimant(s)	Task	Injury	Judgment for
25 Mar 2004	Bournemouth County	Lambeth	Handling money	Osteoarthritis, exacerbation of	Defendant

The Claimant alleged that as a result of his employment by the Defendant as a toll booth operator on the Poole Harbour ferry he had suffered exacerbation, by a period of two years, of osteoarthritis in his left shoulder, neck and spine. It was alleged that the claimant was obliged to collect toll money and tickets from motorists in an unsuitable manner having regard to the layout of the toll booths. The Defendant denied that the working conditions of a toll booth operator were negligent and disputed that there had been any such exacerbation of his osteoarthritis at all.

The issues at trial were: whether the Claimant's symptoms in his left shoulder, neck and spine were causally related to the layout of the toll booth; whether the Claimant's working posture had advanced his medical problems by two years or by any period that the Court could determine; whether the layout of the toll booths was of such a poor standard as to give rise to a foreseeable risk of injury and or unsuitable within the relevant regulations; whether health and safety standards had been compromised or whether criticisms of the toll booths were restricted to comfort and convenience; and whether any defects, if found, caused or contributed to the level of the Claimant's injury.

The Claimant's case was that the various movements consequent upon the manner in which the toll booth was laid out gave rise to a foreseeable risk of personal injury and therefore the system of work was one which no reasonable employer could have operated. Following complaints made by the Claimant and his trade union representative, in April 2000 the Defendant had commissioned an Ergonomics Consultancy to report on the toll booths. The criticisms set out in the report of the Ergonomics Consultancy were adopted by the Claimant's Ergonomics Expert and the various changes that were made in the layout of the toll booths were presented as an implicit admission of liability.

HH Judge Hughes concluded that no adverse inferences relating to liability could be drawn from the changes to the toll booths made by the Defendant after the receipt of the report of the Ergonomics Consultancy. It was simply a case of a responsible employer trying to deal properly with complaints. When the Defendant was presented with ergonomic advice, it accepted it. The report did not identify an unsafe system of work.

It was plain from the evidence that the Claimant had suffered from recurrent problems with his neck and left shoulder for many years prior to his employment as a toll booth attendant. The instances of pain to the neck, left shoulder and back were increasing in frequency. The instances reported after the Claimant transferred to working in the toll booths did not seem to bear any correlation with the level of work activity. After reviewing the medical evidence, HH Judge Hughes found that the Claimant had failed to prove that his employment as a toll booth operator precipitated the symptoms of the disease or that there was any acceleration of a degenerative condition that had progressively got worse as the years passed.

HH Judge Hughes concluded that there were no material defects to the toll booths, that the Defendant was not in breach of any duty to the Claimant and that the Claimant had failed to prove that any feature of his work as a toll booth attendant caused or contributed to the progression of his osteoarthritis.

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Last updated: 16/10/2009