Drivers may be presumed liable if a child is hit
Discussion
www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,175-1256235,00.html
Drivers may be presumed liable if a child is hit
By Ben Webster, Transport Correspondent
DRIVERS who knock down children should have to pay compensation even if the victim ran out without looking, according to a report commissioned by the Government.
The motorist would be assumed to be responsible in civil proceedings for any collision involving a child in a residential area. Bereaved parents could claim compensation from the driver’s insurers and he would lose any no-claims bonus.
The driver could avoid being held responsible only if he could prove that he had taken every reasonable step to avoid the collision.
Complying with the speed limit would not be a sufficient defence because the driver should have realised that there was a possibility of a child running out and reduced his speed accordingly.
Britain has the best overall road safety record in Europe but one of the highest death rates for child pedestrians. In 2002, 79 pedestrians aged under 16 were killed and 2,800 seriously injured.
The Department for Transport commissioned a group of academics to study road safety policy in other European countries and identify any measures that might save children’s lives.
The study found that the two countries with the lowest child pedestrian death rates, Sweden and the Netherlands, had laws that assumed the driver to be responsible in collisions with children. Germany, which had the fourth lowest rate, had a similar law.
The study recommended that the Government should consider introducing the same principle into English law.
Nicola Christie, senior researcher in public health at Surrey University and the lead author of the study, said: “While it goes against the grain to assume guilt unless it is proven, this law could help to reduce deaths and injuries because drivers would be more careful.”
The Dutch law was set in 1988 in a case involving a 13-year-old girl who cycled suddenly out of a side road and was hit and seriously injured by a car that had priority on a main road. The Dutch Supreme Court ruled that children under 14 could not be expected to observe traffic rules and ordered the driver to pay all the damages and costs.
Willem Vermeulen, safety researcher at the Dutch Traffic Department, said: “This law has had a psychological effect in making drivers more aware of the vulnerability of children. If they see a ball bounce into the road they have to assume that a child will run out after it. They know that if they hit a child, practically the only excuse accepted is that the child voluntarily threw itself under the car.”
Mr Vermeulen said that the law had initally been met with furious protests by Dutch motorists. “But our society has now widely accepted that drivers need an extra burden because of their powerful position in traffic. The current debate is whether to extend the law to children over 14.”
Zoe Stow, head of RoadPeace, the charity that supports those bereaved and injured by road crashes, said that too many drivers were able to escape responsibility for collisions because of the lack of witnesses: “The driver can easily blame the child because the child may be dead and unable to defend itself. We need to change the burden of proof so that fewer drivers get off scot-free.”
Rob Gifford, director of the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety, said: “Some drivers may be forced to pay out when there was no fault at all on their part. But that is an acceptable price to pay for civilising our streets.”
Andrew Howard, the AA’s head of road safety, said that the law would push up every motorist’s insurance costs but he doubted it would do much to change drivers’ attitudes.
A DfT spokesman said: “We will consider this, but it would require quite a radical shift in the law.”
We spent nine days watching our son die
By Ben Webster
CHRISTINE BRADFORD prayed on the way to the hospital that the police had made a mistake.
An officer had called at her home in Rotherhithe, southeast London, to say that a boy had been knocked down by a car a quarter of a mile away.
“The only identification was his mobile phone, so I didn’t know for sure it was Michael until I saw him lying unconscious and terribly injured at the Royal London Hospital.
“We spent nine days there slowly watching him die.”
The 14-year-old boy had been going to meet friends in January 2001 when he was hit by a car while crossing the road at traffic lights. He was thrown 25ft (8 metres) and suffered severe brain injuries and three breaks to his spine.
Months later it emerged that the passenger in the car had repeatedly warned the driver that a boy was standing on the pavement at the junction. But the driver failed to brake and three witnesses claimed that he jumped a red light.
The police took no action against the driver over Michael’s death, claiming that there was conflicting evidence in witness statements. But they prosecuted him for having no insurance and for driving while having 12 points on his licence.
He was banned for six months and fined £100.
Almost four years later Mrs Bradford is still engaged in a legal battle to secure compensation from the Motor Insurers’ Bureau, which was established to assist the victims of uninsured drivers.
“Changing the law to put the burden of proof on drivers won’t bring Michael back but it could help to prevent other families from suffering the grief we have endured,” she said.
“The Motor Insurers’ Bureau wrote and told us that we hadn’t suffered trauma, but you cannot imagine how painful it was watching Michael throwing his arms around as he lay dying in the hospital.”
DEBATE
Would this measure reduce the number of road deaths?
Send your e-mails to debate@thetimes.co.uk
>>> Edited by Mon Ami Mate on Saturday 11th September 08:35
Drivers may be presumed liable if a child is hit
By Ben Webster, Transport Correspondent
DRIVERS who knock down children should have to pay compensation even if the victim ran out without looking, according to a report commissioned by the Government.
The motorist would be assumed to be responsible in civil proceedings for any collision involving a child in a residential area. Bereaved parents could claim compensation from the driver’s insurers and he would lose any no-claims bonus.
The driver could avoid being held responsible only if he could prove that he had taken every reasonable step to avoid the collision.
Complying with the speed limit would not be a sufficient defence because the driver should have realised that there was a possibility of a child running out and reduced his speed accordingly.
Britain has the best overall road safety record in Europe but one of the highest death rates for child pedestrians. In 2002, 79 pedestrians aged under 16 were killed and 2,800 seriously injured.
The Department for Transport commissioned a group of academics to study road safety policy in other European countries and identify any measures that might save children’s lives.
The study found that the two countries with the lowest child pedestrian death rates, Sweden and the Netherlands, had laws that assumed the driver to be responsible in collisions with children. Germany, which had the fourth lowest rate, had a similar law.
The study recommended that the Government should consider introducing the same principle into English law.
Nicola Christie, senior researcher in public health at Surrey University and the lead author of the study, said: “While it goes against the grain to assume guilt unless it is proven, this law could help to reduce deaths and injuries because drivers would be more careful.”
The Dutch law was set in 1988 in a case involving a 13-year-old girl who cycled suddenly out of a side road and was hit and seriously injured by a car that had priority on a main road. The Dutch Supreme Court ruled that children under 14 could not be expected to observe traffic rules and ordered the driver to pay all the damages and costs.
Willem Vermeulen, safety researcher at the Dutch Traffic Department, said: “This law has had a psychological effect in making drivers more aware of the vulnerability of children. If they see a ball bounce into the road they have to assume that a child will run out after it. They know that if they hit a child, practically the only excuse accepted is that the child voluntarily threw itself under the car.”
Mr Vermeulen said that the law had initally been met with furious protests by Dutch motorists. “But our society has now widely accepted that drivers need an extra burden because of their powerful position in traffic. The current debate is whether to extend the law to children over 14.”
Zoe Stow, head of RoadPeace, the charity that supports those bereaved and injured by road crashes, said that too many drivers were able to escape responsibility for collisions because of the lack of witnesses: “The driver can easily blame the child because the child may be dead and unable to defend itself. We need to change the burden of proof so that fewer drivers get off scot-free.”
Rob Gifford, director of the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety, said: “Some drivers may be forced to pay out when there was no fault at all on their part. But that is an acceptable price to pay for civilising our streets.”
Andrew Howard, the AA’s head of road safety, said that the law would push up every motorist’s insurance costs but he doubted it would do much to change drivers’ attitudes.
A DfT spokesman said: “We will consider this, but it would require quite a radical shift in the law.”
We spent nine days watching our son die
By Ben Webster
CHRISTINE BRADFORD prayed on the way to the hospital that the police had made a mistake.
An officer had called at her home in Rotherhithe, southeast London, to say that a boy had been knocked down by a car a quarter of a mile away.
“The only identification was his mobile phone, so I didn’t know for sure it was Michael until I saw him lying unconscious and terribly injured at the Royal London Hospital.
“We spent nine days there slowly watching him die.”
The 14-year-old boy had been going to meet friends in January 2001 when he was hit by a car while crossing the road at traffic lights. He was thrown 25ft (8 metres) and suffered severe brain injuries and three breaks to his spine.
Months later it emerged that the passenger in the car had repeatedly warned the driver that a boy was standing on the pavement at the junction. But the driver failed to brake and three witnesses claimed that he jumped a red light.
The police took no action against the driver over Michael’s death, claiming that there was conflicting evidence in witness statements. But they prosecuted him for having no insurance and for driving while having 12 points on his licence.
He was banned for six months and fined £100.
Almost four years later Mrs Bradford is still engaged in a legal battle to secure compensation from the Motor Insurers’ Bureau, which was established to assist the victims of uninsured drivers.
“Changing the law to put the burden of proof on drivers won’t bring Michael back but it could help to prevent other families from suffering the grief we have endured,” she said.
“The Motor Insurers’ Bureau wrote and told us that we hadn’t suffered trauma, but you cannot imagine how painful it was watching Michael throwing his arms around as he lay dying in the hospital.”
DEBATE
Would this measure reduce the number of road deaths?
Send your e-mails to debate@thetimes.co.uk
>>> Edited by Mon Ami Mate on Saturday 11th September 08:35
I thought that it was a fundamental premise in English law that nothing was presumed in advance of a court hearing?
If anyone tried to "presume" my guilt - I would insist on a court trial and then argue that the case be thrown out on the basis that a fair trial was impossible because of presumed guilt in advance. If that failed I'd be winging my way to the Court of Human Rights in Luxenbourg.
If anyone tried to "presume" my guilt - I would insist on a court trial and then argue that the case be thrown out on the basis that a fair trial was impossible because of presumed guilt in advance. If that failed I'd be winging my way to the Court of Human Rights in Luxenbourg.
bor said:
Yes. Good proposal. Removes a grey area of who is responsible in a collision and puts the emphasis on the motorist to take utmost care. Combined with the natural instincts of self-preservation of pedestrian this could lead to a reduction in death/injury.
With the greatest respect, this is absolute bolliolocks.
Responsibility during a collision depends on the individual instance.
This suggests motorists do not currently drive carefully when there is a danger of children being around and that drivers currently dont give a damn.
Ridiculous, you can drive as carefully as you like, if I run in to YOU what are you going to do?
Self-preservation of the pedestrian!!!!! The issue here is that the kids are assumed to lack all self-preservation instincts.
This is just another example of tackling the problem upside and back to front.
What good is compensation AFTER the event. Surely the priority should be on prevention not punishment.
Resorting to solving problems by putting fear and worry into people is not the way to go.
What happens when a parent knocks down their own child?
Who sues who? Who compensates Who?
What next - Prosecute fireworks manufacturers when kids pick up hot sparklers wrong end up.
Prosecute food manufacturers for obese kids.
Prosecute teachers when kids decide to bunk of school.
The point is, Erich,
that it's not so much about proving who is at fault but about emphasisng the responsibility motorists have.
Children/teenagers don't always have the ability/experience to always stay out of trouble/danger. The onus is on the motorist, in effect to think for them.
that it's not so much about proving who is at fault but about emphasisng the responsibility motorists have.
Children/teenagers don't always have the ability/experience to always stay out of trouble/danger. The onus is on the motorist, in effect to think for them.
I dont know what to think of this,
I would like to think I can trust the authorities to investigate the case properly if this ever happened to me (as the driver) but isnt it easier for them to blame the driver
So if you are driving down a road 20 mph with parked cars on the left and a child runs out so close that you cannot react fast enough to stop before hitting, what else do you have to do to prove your innocence?
I would like to think I can trust the authorities to investigate the case properly if this ever happened to me (as the driver) but isnt it easier for them to blame the driver
So if you are driving down a road 20 mph with parked cars on the left and a child runs out so close that you cannot react fast enough to stop before hitting, what else do you have to do to prove your innocence?
Stop, Look, Listen etc.
Schemes to make kids aware, parents to. Having been taught about the dangers, i have yet to be run over. Responsible parents and a level of self preservation.
The motorist does have a responsibility to be aware, but the suggestion that in all cases they are deemed to be at fault is ridiculous. There should be a suggested cost to the parents, should there be damage to an innocent motorists car, let alone the mental trauma the driver will have gone through in dealing with the aftermath.
The only way to avoid this happpening is not to drive.
Schemes to make kids aware, parents to. Having been taught about the dangers, i have yet to be run over. Responsible parents and a level of self preservation.
The motorist does have a responsibility to be aware, but the suggestion that in all cases they are deemed to be at fault is ridiculous. There should be a suggested cost to the parents, should there be damage to an innocent motorists car, let alone the mental trauma the driver will have gone through in dealing with the aftermath.
The only way to avoid this happpening is not to drive.
What about kids playing chicken... NO NO NO. It is a basic premise in law that you are innocent until proven guilty.
We already have the ridiculous situation where you are guilty of speeding unless you can prove you are innocent. That's going to EHCR. The sooner people learn to take responsibility for themselves, the better. Children need to be taught that roads are dangerous from an early age.
What kind of society will we be raising if we teach children that someone else will always look out for them.
Motorists have been persecuted enough and it's got to stop.
NO NO NO.
We already have the ridiculous situation where you are guilty of speeding unless you can prove you are innocent. That's going to EHCR. The sooner people learn to take responsibility for themselves, the better. Children need to be taught that roads are dangerous from an early age.
What kind of society will we be raising if we teach children that someone else will always look out for them.
Motorists have been persecuted enough and it's got to stop.
NO NO NO.
This 'no fault liability' idea has been floated by the EU before, IIRC at that time the UK gov't rejected it. Making drivers liable for accidents where they carry no blame is fundamentally wrong and will damage road safety further as it appears to make some categories of road user infallible. We already have enough divine right cyclists and powercrazed pedestrians.
The argument seems to be that it's an unjust law but worth it if it makes drivers more careful and responsible. On that basis why not make parents blameworthy when children are involved in crashes where a driver has done nothing wrong, since that would make irreponsible parents more careful - perhaps they might start teaching road safety and supervising their children. This is just as loopy as the original idea, but when it's put that way it might make the lobotomised politicians and 'safety gurus' think again.
The argument seems to be that it's an unjust law but worth it if it makes drivers more careful and responsible. On that basis why not make parents blameworthy when children are involved in crashes where a driver has done nothing wrong, since that would make irreponsible parents more careful - perhaps they might start teaching road safety and supervising their children. This is just as loopy as the original idea, but when it's put that way it might make the lobotomised politicians and 'safety gurus' think again.
An absurd idea; even less excuse to be responsible for one's own actions.
Roads are for cars and have been designed as such since the dawn of motoring.
It should be the other way around, if a pedestrian ventures onto the road and gets hit by a car, it should more sensibly be the pedestrian who is presumed at fault.
It's not difficult for a pedestrian to stop, look and listen and is a routine that should be drummed in again and again at school age and at various ages.
More nanny state, no wonder children (and some adults) are becoming less and less responsible for their actions. It's always someone else's fault now.
Roads are for cars and have been designed as such since the dawn of motoring.
It should be the other way around, if a pedestrian ventures onto the road and gets hit by a car, it should more sensibly be the pedestrian who is presumed at fault.
It's not difficult for a pedestrian to stop, look and listen and is a routine that should be drummed in again and again at school age and at various ages.
More nanny state, no wonder children (and some adults) are becoming less and less responsible for their actions. It's always someone else's fault now.
bor said:
The point is, Erich,
that it's not so much about proving who is at fault but about emphasisng the responsibility motorists have.
Children/teenagers don't always have the ability/experience to always stay out of trouble/danger. The onus is on the motorist, in effect to think for them.
Moron Alert! I have never heard such a crock of total bollox in my life!
I simply cannot believe we have muppets like this wandering amongst us, yet here he is.
I guess that the best thing that could happen to you is for such a law (backed by you) to be introduced, and hopefully youll be its first victim, dipstick.
Responsibility should be PROVED not PRESUMED!
Got any more stupid statements to make?
>> Edited by deltaf on Saturday 11th September 09:18
gh0st said:
E-mailed the times. Don't just sit here moaning, they want opinions. If we are not heard, this will happen
Whatcha send? gwonnnn tellus tellus
Not my finest work, just a slightly extended version of my comments earlier in the thread. Hangover and wordsmith do not make good bedfellows.These absurd proposals surface every couple of months, and then quetly die away. I seem to remember a similar one converning motorists and cyclists not so long ago.
I sometimes wonder are the powers that be just throwing out these ideas so that we can all engage in a ranting and raving session whilst they get on with their usual job of ruining (sorry - running) the country.
And yes, children (ALL other pedestrians for that matter) MUST take equal responsibility for their own safety when out and about.
Many many years ago my grandfather had the unfortunate experience of killing a young boy who dashed out into the road chassing a hurley ball (it was in Ireland in the 1940s) and fell under the wheels of my grandad's lorry. No one blamed my grandad for that terrible accident - it was just one of those things.
I sometimes wonder are the powers that be just throwing out these ideas so that we can all engage in a ranting and raving session whilst they get on with their usual job of ruining (sorry - running) the country.
And yes, children (ALL other pedestrians for that matter) MUST take equal responsibility for their own safety when out and about.
Many many years ago my grandfather had the unfortunate experience of killing a young boy who dashed out into the road chassing a hurley ball (it was in Ireland in the 1940s) and fell under the wheels of my grandad's lorry. No one blamed my grandad for that terrible accident - it was just one of those things.
Take this a step further.
Surely it si the gov's fault for building roads close to housing and schools, parks etc where kids are expected to be.
Surely the Gov. (DoT) have a duty of care to consider these things.
Build family housing away from roads. Build schools away from roads.
Solve the school run problem as well
Surely it si the gov's fault for building roads close to housing and schools, parks etc where kids are expected to be.
Surely the Gov. (DoT) have a duty of care to consider these things.
Build family housing away from roads. Build schools away from roads.
Solve the school run problem as well
RobDickinson said:
Where the fek is the green cross code man? off rulling an evil space empire somewhere?
Children have to know they cant run out into roads, its not safe. What am I supposed to do, stop in the road everytime I see a child on the pavement?
How true that is. When I was a kid we din't even need Darth Vader - just seeing the naughty weasels get run over near Tufty's house has kept me safe for 40 years.
This country's gone effing insane - there was a thing on R4 this am about West Yorks Police using their multi-million pound helicopter to apprehend two boys who' taken a pedalo out onto a lake with out permission or paying. FFS...
Once this ludicrous piece of twisted claptrap gets onto the statute book watch out for the amendments that will follow
- if a cyclist or pedestrian walks or cycles into a parked car, the car owner is liable
- if a cyclist falls off their bike, the driver of the nearest car at the time is liable
- if a pedestrian trips on the pavement, the nearest car-owning householder is liable
You know it makes sense
Wonder what happens when a cyclist knocks down a pedestrian, they kill 5 or 6 each year IIRC. Edited to add - if one of them also owns a car that would decide it, if both do then the one with the 4x4 or the most power would be nailed. Obvious really.
>> Edited by turbobloke on Saturday 11th September 09:47
- if a cyclist or pedestrian walks or cycles into a parked car, the car owner is liable
- if a cyclist falls off their bike, the driver of the nearest car at the time is liable
- if a pedestrian trips on the pavement, the nearest car-owning householder is liable
You know it makes sense
Wonder what happens when a cyclist knocks down a pedestrian, they kill 5 or 6 each year IIRC. Edited to add - if one of them also owns a car that would decide it, if both do then the one with the 4x4 or the most power would be nailed. Obvious really.
>> Edited by turbobloke on Saturday 11th September 09:47
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