Personal injuries - Negligence – Duty of care – Injury – Appellant seeking damages – Whether duty of care should extend to a bus driver having to satisfy himself or herself that passengers are actually seated before the bus moves away from a stop.  

Facts: The plaintiff/appellant, Ms McGarr, on the 3rd October 2008, fell backwards down the stairs of a No. 19 bus shortly after paying her fare and before she had reached the top of the internal stairs. She suffered a nasty injury. She alleged that the bus driver drove his bus negligently as it moved off from the stop where she had got on. She said in her evidence that as she approached the top of the stairs there was a sudden jerk of the bus which caused her to fall backwards and all the way down to the bottom of the stairs. Another passenger who was seated downstairs on the same bus gave evidence that just before the plaintiff landed at the bottom of the stairs, the bus jerked or jolted quite violently as it moved away from the stop. Having heard all the evidence adduced by the parties, and having viewed the CCTV footage of the incident taken by cameras situated within the bus, the trial judge (White J) found that the plaintiff had not made out a case in negligence against the defendant, and dismissed her claim. The plaintiff appealed to the Court of Appeal against that finding. 
Held by Peart J that while he had every sympathy for the plaintiff for the injury which she sustained and for the obvious distress that she suffered at the time, it was nevertheless the case, as the trial judge found, that she was the author of her own misfortune by mounting the stairs in the manner which had been found to be the case. Peart J held that he would dismiss the plaintiff’s appeal. Appeal dismissed. 
McGarr, Margaret v Dublin Bus/Bus Atha Cliath
5/12/2016 No. 2015/260 [2016] IECA 366