Green v Yorkshire Traction Company Ltd

The duty to maintain work equipment in an efficient state under regulation 6(1) of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1992 is absolute as to the need for compliance, but it does not impose an absolute guarantee that no accident will occur. The equipment must be assessed by the ordinary meaning of the statutory words and in its ordinary working context. A bus step is not necessarily unmaintained merely because rainwater has been carried on to it during normal service on a rainy day. The Framework Directive does not require Member States to impose absolute obligations extending beyond the domestic regulations.

The claimant, a bus driver, slipped while leaving a bus during rainy weather and injured his back. The county court found that rainwater had probably been brought on to the step by passengers and held the defendant liable for breach of regulation 6(1) of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1992. The defendant appealed against the finding of liability.

The principal issue was whether a bus step, otherwise sound and properly constructed, ceased to have been maintained in an efficient state merely because ordinary use in rainy weather caused water to be present on it.

1. The appeal was allowed. The finding of liability was set aside, and the claimant was ordered to pay the defendant’s costs in the Court of Appeal and below, assessed at £9,322 as agreed. Permission to appeal to the House of Lords was refused.
2. The court accepted the approach in Stark v The Post Office [2000] PIQR 105: regulation 6(1) imposes an absolute duty in the sense that, once work equipment is not maintained in an efficient state, proof of fault is unnecessary. The Framework Directive does not itself require an absolute obligation, however. Its requirements must be understood alongside the Work Equipment Directive and the domestic regulations.
3. The relevant question was therefore whether the bus step could properly be described, in the ordinary meaning of the words, as not maintained in an efficient state. The condition of the equipment, its ordinary use and the circumstances creating the risk had to be considered.
4. A bus operating normally in ordinary rainy weather could not be described as unmaintained merely because water had reached the step from passengers’ clothing or footwear. Treating that condition as a breach would impose the absolute guarantee rejected by the court.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): allowed the appeal from the decision of His Honour Judge Cockroft in the Wakefield County Court on 14 February 2001, which had given judgment for the claimant on liability.