Karen O’Sullivan provides a crash course in the issues that arise around liability in road traffic litigation
Road traffic litigation is often looked down on by other litigators as being unchallenging when it comes to liability. The phrase “smash and bash” epitomises this perhaps intellectually snobbish view. There are no “six pack” regulations, for example, and causation is rarely a thorny issue. However, to the people involved in these sometimes horrific events the cases are certainly important. Not only are road accidents far more common than other types of accidents, they often cause the most serious injuries. They are therefore arguably the most important type of personal injury work, leading to the highest value claims.
Overruled?
Yet is it correct to take the view that RTA never has any interesting points of law on liability? The last few weeks have seen a clutch of reported cases, two of which are appeals suggesting that parties’ advisers are happy to assert that a judge has got a “simple” RTA
