A previous finding that a driver and Sligo County Council shared responsibility for a lorry accident did not decide the dispute between the council and Waste Disposal Sligo Limited, the High Court has ruled.
In a judgment delivered on 5 December 2005, Finnegan P. considered whether an earlier action arising from the 12 September 2000 accident prevented the defendants from contesting their liability between themselves in the present proceedings.
The earlier action was brought by Paul Rooney, an employee of Waste Disposal Sligo Limited. He alleged that the company’s lorry went out of control, skidded and hit a telegraph pole, causing him injury. He alleged negligence by both defendants, including loose chippings on the road and a dangerously defective lorry. The defendants each alleged that the other, and Rooney, had contributed to the accident.
At the 2005 hearing, the proceedings against the waste company were struck out. The order found the first defendant negligent and Rooney contributorily negligent, apportioning fault 40% to the defendant and 60% to Rooney. The order also recorded damages against the first defendant. The judge stressed that Rooney’s claim against the waste company had been struck out, not dismissed, and that there had been no decision on its merits. Nor had the defendants’ claims against each other for contribution or indemnity been determined.
The plaintiff in the present action was a passenger in the lorry and had also suffered personal injury. His claim against the defendants was described as identical, for present purposes, to Rooney’s. The second defendant argued that the earlier apportionment settled the issue of liability between the defendants and created an issue estoppel.
The court rejected that argument. It held that the earlier apportionment between Rooney and the council did not determine the dispute between the council and the waste company. Although both defendants had been parties to the earlier action, the second defendant took no part in its hearing, and their contribution and indemnity issues remained unresolved. The judgment also concluded that Rooney was not in law the second defendant’s privy for this purpose.
Finnegan P. ruled that the dispute between the defendants remained to be determined in the earlier action and that issue estoppel did not arise in the present proceedings. He also found no abuse of process in seeking a determination of that issue in the present case. The judgment does not state a final determination of the present plaintiff’s personal injury claim.