Mason v Satelcom Ltd
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | HIS HONOUR JUDGE REDDIHOUGH,(Sitting as a Judge of the High Court) |
| Judgment Date | 24 July 2007 |
| Neutral Citation | [2007] EWHC 2540 (QB) |
| Docket Number | Claim No.HQ05X02516 |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division |
| Date | 24 July 2007 |
[2007] EWHC 2540 (QB)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN's BENCH DIVISION
His Honour Judge Reddihough
(Sitting as a Judge of the High Court)
Claim No.HQ05X02516
Hearing dates: 17–19 July 2007
APPROVED JUDGMENT
HIS HONOUR JUDGE REDDIHOUGH
The claims before the court arise out of an accident in which the Claimant, Adam Mason, was involved on 28 th August, 2002, during the course of his employment as a field service engineer. At that time he was employed by Satelcom Limited and on 1 st June, 2004, his employment was transferred under the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations, 1981, to an associated company, Intact Networks Limited. At the time of the accident the London Borough of Redbridge was a customer of Satelcom Limited pursuant to a contract which had been made between it and a predecessor company of Satelcom Limited, whereby Satelcom Limited provided, installed and maintained data switching equipment at various council sites in that London Borough. Under the contract Satelcom Limited was responsible for the provision of certain on site maintenance and also software and technical support.
In May 2002, the London Borough of Redbridge took an underlease of some office space at premises known as Redbridge Foyer, Sylvan Road, Ilford. In that office space at the material time the London Borough of Redbridge operated a service known as Ilfomation, which was essentially an information service for young people. East Homes Limited, a housing association, was then the owner of Redbridge Foyer, and its subsidiary company, East Potential Limited, was the managing agent of the premises.
One of the rooms in the Redbridge Foyer premises was a communications (or server) room where computer and information technology equipment was located. Although this room was not included in the London Borough of Redbridge's lease, it had been permitted by the owners to have installed there a cabinet in which was situated a piece of equipment known as a Megapac (or Megabox). This is a form of router which effected communications between Ilfomation and the rest of the London Borough of Redbridge's information technology systems. It appears that the remainder of the equipment in the server room was the property of the owners or their managing agents. The Megapac was one of the pieces of equipment subject to the maintenance provisions in the contract between Satelcom Limited and the London Borough of Redbridge.
The Claimant's accident on 28 th August, 2002, occurred in this server room at the Redbridge Foyer when he was in the course of replacing a card (a form of circuit board) in the Megapac. A fault had apparently developed in the Megapac the previous day and the London Borough of Redbridge contacted Satelcom about it and the Claimant was sent there to replace the card. The cabinet housing the Megapac was on a wall in the server room at a height of 244 cm. (about 8 feet) from the floor. The Claimant asserts he was using a ladder, which was in the room, to gain access to the cabinet and Megapac and in the course of his work thereon he lost his balance and fell from the ladder, landing on his feet but sustaining an injury to his spine.
Initially, the Claimant directed his claim, which is for damages for personal injury and loss resulting from the accident, at Satelcom Limited/Intact Networks Limited as his employers, the London Borough of Redbridge/Ilfomation, and East Homes Limited and East Potential Limited. He subsequently discontinued his claim against all parties save his employers, Satelcom Limited and Intact Networks Limited, who are now the First and Second Defendants. It is agreed that, for the purposes of this claim, those Defendants can be treated as one and the same and I refer to them hereafter as the Defendants. The Claimant alleges that his accident was caused by the breach of statutory duty and/or the negligence of the Defendants, their servants or agents.
The discontinuance of the claim against the other parties by the Claimant led to the Defendants bringing Part 20 additional claims against the London Borough of Redbridge, East Potential Limited and East Homes Limited, who became Third, Fourth and Fifth Parties respectively. It is agreed that, for the purposes of these claims, the Fourth and Fifth Parties can be considered as one and the same and I will refer to them hereafter jointly as East where appropriate. The London Borough of Redbridge I will refer to as Redbridge. By way of these Part 20 claims, the Defendants, in the event that they are adjudged liable to the Claimant, claim a contribution in respect of such liability from Redbridge and East on the basis that the Claimant's accident was caused by the breach of statutory duty and/or negligence of those parties.
By the Order of Master Yoxall of 20 th February, 2007, it was ordered that the issue of the Defendants' liability to the Claimant, the extent of that liability, and the liability of Redbridge and East to the Defendants in respect of the Part 20 claims, be tried as preliminary issues. It is those preliminary issues which I have to determine.
On behalf of the Claimant, the evidence consisted of witness statements and oral evidence from the Claimant and from Mr. Matthew Johnson. At the conclusion of the Claimant's case, the Defendants, Redbridge and East all indicated that they did not propose to call any evidence. However, pursuant to Part 32.5(5), the Defendants put in as hearsay evidence various witness statements which had been served on behalf of Redbridge and East respectively. These were two witness statements from Mr. Peter Freeman and one from Mr. Scott Howell served by Redbridge, and a statement from Ms. Tracey McGurl served by East. Of course, insofar as the Defendants rely upon those statements as hearsay evidence, I bear in mind when considering them that the makers of them were not exposed to any cross-examination. Additionally, I was referred to various documents disclosed by the parties.
The Claimant, who is now 40 years old, confirmed in his evidence before me the contents of his two witness statements, subject to a couple of matters which he corrected. In his first witness statement he indicated that he had been employed by the Defendants as a field service engineer since December 1999. His job involved the installation, maintenance and repair of computer network equipment. He would normally carry out such work at the premises of the Defendants' customers. He said that he had been given no specific training by the Defendants in respect of issues involving health and safety, manual handling, etc.
The Claimant described how he came to attend the Redbridge Foyer premises on 28 th August, 2002, in order to replace a card in the Megapac (to which I have already referred), following the reporting of a fault in the system by Redbridge the previous day. The Claimant thought that he had been requested to attend there by one of the Defendants' account managers, Mr. Matt Johnson. In fact, Mr. Johnson did not recall making this request. The Claimant described what the job would involve, namely connecting a laptop to the service port of the Megapac to monitor its activity, disconnecting existing cables, unscrewing and removing the faulty card, inserting the new card, and reconnecting the cables. He thought that, prior to going to Redbridge Foyer, he had met up with Mr. Scott Howell of Redbridge's IT department at Redbridge's Clements Road premises in Ilford. Mr. Howell in his statement thought that any such contact with the Claimant had been on the telephone.
The Claimant went on to describe in his statement how, when he arrived at the Redbridge Foyer, a member of staff there took him to the room where the Megapac was situated and unlocked the room for him. The Claimant said he had never been to these premises before. When he entered the room, he could see that the cabinet in which the Megapac was located was positioned high on the wall at a height of 7 to 8 feet above the floor. In fact, it is now agreed between the parties that the cabinet was at a height of 244 cm. (that is, about 8 feet) from the floor. The Claimant stated that, on entering the room, he noticed that there was a wooden ladder leaning against the wall and he realised that he would need to use this to gain access to the cabinet. He said the ladder was not quite long enough to reach the cabinet and rested against the wall just below it. He thought that the ladder was approximately 60 cm. in height when resting against the wall. In his second witness statement and indeed in his oral evidence, the Claimant said that this was an error and should have read 60 inches, not 60 cm.
The work which the Claimant had to do would involve at some stage turning off Redbridge's computer and telephone systems, and the Claimant asserted that a time frame for this disconnection had been limited to 15 minutes and he thought that this was imposed by Redbridge. He went on to describe how the accident occurred. He said that to work on the Megapac inside the cabinet, he had to stand on the ladder, leaning his body outwards, then in, to reach inside the cabinet. He climbed up the ladder and managed to hold onto the cabinet with one hand and unscrew and remove the card with the other hand. The card he had to replace was a double card which slotted into two grooves in the Megapac. He said that this type of card is more difficult to change than a single card and even more so with one hand. It was as he was on the ladder inserting the new card using two hands when...
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