The High Court has rejected the Minister for Health and Children’s application to extend the time for a cross-appeal that would have challenged a woman’s finding of eligibility for hepatitis C compensation.
The claimant, identified in the judgment as C.M., had applied to the Hepatitis C Compensation Tribunal in 2000. The Tribunal found in 2009 that, on the balance of probabilities, she contracted hepatitis C from contaminated Anti-D immunoglobulin administered after the birth of her daughter in 1977. It awarded her €400,480: €150,000 in general damages, €250,000 for loss of employment opportunity and €480 for medical fees.
C.M. appealed the amount of the award. The Minister later sought an extension of time to cross-appeal the Tribunal’s causation finding. The Minister said it needed time to consider legal and scientific issues and obtain expert medical advice. C.M. opposed the application, arguing that the statute did not allow the Minister to challenge causation in this way and that the delay was not adequately explained.
The principal issue before Ms Justice Irvine was whether section 5(15) of the Hepatitis C Compensation Tribunal Act 1997 allowed the Minister to cross-appeal the causation finding when a claimant appealed an award. The judge found that the provision was ambiguous, but concluded that the Act did not give the Minister that right.
The judgment says the Minister’s cross-appeal is confined to responding to the claimant’s appeal: where a claimant challenges an award, the Minister may argue for a lower sum; where a claimant appeals a refusal of compensation, the Minister may argue against that complaint. It does not permit the Minister to reopen causation merely because a claimant appeals the amount awarded.
The court therefore held it had no jurisdiction to extend time for the proposed cross-appeal on causation and declined the Minister’s application. It did not reconsider the Tribunal’s causation finding or alter the compensation award.
The judge added that, if the Minister had been entitled to cross-appeal on causation, she would have granted the extension of time on the evidence before her. That was a conditional observation; the court’s decision was that the Minister had no such entitlement.