The High Court has ruled that an employee charged with driving without insurance can rely on a statutory defence where she was using the vehicle on the owner’s express orders. The court said the defence does not require the employee to meet the conditions of the vehicle’s insurance policy.
Mr Justice Meenan delivered the judgment on 20 May 2019 in a case stated by a District Court judge. The question was whether the defence in section 56(6) of the Road Traffic Act 1961 could apply where the lack of cover resulted from the employee’s own default and she knew the relevant facts at the time.
The accused, Aoife Kirwan, faced a charge under section 56(1) of using a mechanically propelled vehicle without insurance. The facts found by the District Court were that she was driving her employer’s vehicle in the course of her employment and at the employer’s direction when she was involved in a single-vehicle accident at Ballycahane, Portlaw, County Waterford, on 20 October 2016. Gardaí attended and requested insurance documents, which were not later produced.
The employer’s vehicles were covered by an insurance policy, but its terms required a driver to hold the correct licence. The vehicle required a class C licence; Kirwan held a class B licence. The District Court record also stated that she had completed the class C theory test but not the driving test, and accepted that she knew her licence did not cover her to drive that vehicle.
Kirwan sought to rely on section 56(6), which provides a defence where a person charged under the section was the vehicle owner’s servant and used the vehicle in obedience to the owner’s express orders. The High Court concluded that the stated facts met those two requirements. It said the subsection did not add a requirement that the employee comply with the particular insurance policy.
The court referred to A.G. (Hayes) v. Downes, a 1959 case involving the same statutory wording, in which the defence was upheld for a driver ordered to drive by the owner despite having no licence. The High Court answered the stated question “yes”. It did not determine the charge against Kirwan or record a dismissal order; it gave its opinion on the legal question referred by the District Court.