The Court of Appeal refused an appeal brought against the refusal to allow judicial review of the award of compensation made in respect of a disabled child, DS, whose mother was killed. The Appellant’s litigation friend had sought to recover the costs of an extension to her property which was said to have been required to make adaptations due to DS’s pre-existing disability as well as costs associated with the Court of Protection and setting up a trust to manage the money that DS received.
Under paragraph 42 of the 2001 scheme where a child was dependent on the deceased for parental services a tariff award could be made to compensate for this loss under 42(a) and under 42(b) other sums could be payable in respect of ‘other resultant losses’. In the FtT and the UT it was held that the losses claimed did not fall within 42(b) because they were not losses resulting from the loss of parental services but costs that arose due to DS’s pre-existing disabilities.
The Appellant argued that paragraph 42(b) of the 2001 scheme allowed such costs to be recovered and that the FtT and UT had erred by misconstruing the provision or adopting too narrow an approach to it or alternatively, that the losses were in fact losses resulting from the loss of parental services.
The Court of Appeal refused the appeal and rejected the interpretation put forward by the Appellant. The Court held that ‘other’ sums that could be paid under 42(b) had to reflect losses caused by the criminal act (the death of the deceased), so while it could include a sum to reflect the additional care and parental attention that a disabled child had lost due to the death of a parent, it could not include costs arising from the disability itself. The costs claimed arose because of DS’s disability and were not losses caused by the criminal act.
Kara Loraine was instructed by Christopher Yong of the Government Legal Department on behalf of the Interested Party, the CICA.
Read the full judgment here.
