Final Addresses Today In Damages Claim

Press, Volume CV, Issue 31006, 11 March 1966, Page 3

Final Addresses Today In Damages Claim

(New Zealand Press Association)

AUCKLAND, March 10.

Counsel will address the jury and Mr Justice Woodhouse will sum up tomorrow in the Supreme Court at Auckland in the hearing of a claim by Hubert Watts, aged 54, a railway employee who was injured when a case of fruit fell from a railway waggon and struck him.

Watts is represented by Mr J. D. Dalgety and Mr S. G. Lockhart. He is claiming £30,000 general damages and £4500 to £5OOO special damages.

The plaintiff was badly injured when a case of fruit fell about 10 feet from a railway waggon and struck him on the back of the neck on March 25, 1963. He alleges negligence and is claiming damages from the Apple and Pear Marketing Board (Mr M. H. Vautier) as first defendant and the Attor-ney-General sued in respect of the Railways Department (Mr G. D. Speight), as the second defendant. The Apple and Pear Marketing Board was fully responsible for the accident, Mr Speight said. The case of pears which struck Watts came from a waggon incorrectly loaded by employees of the board, he said.

Before the accident the Railways Department had ensured that the board knew and was using correct methods of loading. Mr Speight said that there might be room to say that with a super-careful review of the Railways Department system and with enough staff to watch the loading of every waggon and with enough money to buy thousands of new trucks the accident would not have happened. Mr Speight said the board had primary responsibility. The Railways Department could have secondary responsibility only if faulty loading was common. But even the board denied this.

Three witnesses would say that they had discussed loading with officers of the board, and had been satisfied that they were aware that the crossways system was the correct system. Evidence had shown that cases of fruit had fallen from waggons before, but that this was not common. “The Apple and Pear Board loaded this waggon, sealed it, and sent it on,” said Mr Speight. “The responsibility is theirs.” Frederick George Molesworth, retired special duties transport officer for the Railways, told the Court that after a 1959 accident at Palmerston North he had gone to Hastings to instruct officers of the board not to stack longways. They’ had been very co-op-erative. Molesworth said he was satisfied that they were aware of and using the crossways method. Molesworth said to Mr Vautier that the department's’ traffic code said fruit must be stored firmly to prevent move, ment. He agreed that it did not say that it should be stowed crossways opposite the doors. He had not thought the Palmerston North incident worthy of a memorandum to the manager of the board, because the man hit had been only slightly grazed.