Mother hurt in dumper truck crash wins five year legal battle to change payout laws

Victory: Charli Lewington won a five year battle to change payout laws
Benedict Moore-Bridger6 December 2017

A young mother who suffered life-changing injuries when she swerved off the road to avoid two stolen dumper trucks has won a five-year battle to change the law on payouts.

Charli Lewington, 31, suffered a broken neck and back when she hit a tree and crashed into a shed to avoid hitting the two trucks.

The Motor Insurance Bureau, which usually offers a financial settlement to those injured by uninsured motorists, refused to pay as it counted the trucks as “off-road vehicles”.

Lawyers said “thousands” of innocent drivers who suffered life-changing injuries through no fault of their own have failed to receive compensation because of the legal loophole.

Ms Lewington, from Enfield, who still has only limited use of her left arm and is in constant pain, spent five years and eight months trying to change the law.

She finally won her battle at the High Court last month.

Injured: Charli Lewington

The ruling effectively means that all “off-road vehicles”, including construction site vehicles, plant machinery, trail bikes and dirt bikes, must be insured if driven on a road.

It also means innocent victims injured by uninsured off-road vehicles, or the families of those killed, can now claim compensation.

Ms Lewington was driving on the A120 in Essex late at night with a friend when she swerved to avoid the unlit dumper trucks.

She said: “It was absolutely terrifying and I remember screaming that we were going to crash. I can’t remember the impact or pieces of wooden fence coming through my windscreen. I remember trying to move but I was trapped in the car.”

Ms Lewington’s friend ran to get help and she was cut from the car and taken to hospital. She had fractured her neck in three places, her back in two, broken two ribs and shattered her left elbow. She had also severed an artery in her left arm, leaving her unable to use it.

The dumper trucks had been stolen from a quarry and were being driven without lights on the public road. After the crash the criminals fled and have not been traced.

Ms Lewington said she had assumed she would be legally protected because she was an innocent party but was stunned to find out that she was not entitled to any compensation.

She said: “I did nothing wrong — I don’t drink or do drugs and I wasn’t speeding, my car was in good working order and I had insurance. Yet I was made to feel like I had done something wrong. I was made to fight for almost six years.”

The MIB first refused her request for compensation under the Untraced Drivers’ Agreement 2003.

On appeal, through an arbitration process, her application was rejected twice, before the High Court ruled in her favour.

The hearing concerned the proper interpretation of a part of the Road Traffic Act 1988 on motor vehicles.

Judge Mr Justice Bryan said there had been errors in law and ruled that dumper trucks needed to be insured.

Ms Lewington said the hardest thing was the effect her injuries have had on her relationship with her son Hayden, eight, because “he wouldn’t come to me for six months as he was scared of hurting my arms”.

Her barrister Andrew Ritchie QC hailed the end of the “erroneous” so-called off-road defence, saying: “For decades the MIB has been refusing compensation where off-road vehicles have injured members of the public. That defence has been made pretty much extinct.”

Jennifer Maloney, a specialist serious injury lawyer from Slater and Gordon, which represents Ms Lewington, said: “We are delighted that we have been able to help Ms Lewington get justice and change the law.”

Paul Ryman-Tubb, of the MIB, said: “We accept the judgment, which reverses the decision of the independent arbitrator.”

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