Members of the judiciary are expected at a meeting on Friday to give their backing to draft amended guidelines providing for a 16.7 per cent rise in personal injuries awards.
The Judicial Council, comprising all the State’s judges, is expected to approve its board’s proposal to send the draft amended guidelines to the Minister for Justice to be laid before the Oireachtas.
The Judicial Council Act 2019 provides, once that is done, the guidelines return before the council for a formal vote.
The 16.7 per cent increase reflects the rise in inflation since the original guidelines were approved by a majority of judges in 2021.
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The proposed amendments would represent good news for plaintiffs, but have been met with concern from insurers, employers and the Alliance for Insurance Reform.
Judges must have regard to the guidelines when deciding awards and must give reasons for any departure from them.
The 2021 guidelines slashed awards for mainly minor personal injuries by an average of 30 per cent. The 16.7 per cent increase would not restore awards to the levels they were under the Book of Quantum, which was replaced by the 2021 guidelines.
Prepared by the council’s personal injuries guidelines committee, the original guidelines came into effect in April 2021 after approval by a majority of judges.
The 2019 Act required the council to prepare guidelines and review them after three years.
That review, completed by the committee last March, took account of inflation and recommended that the Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices current of last February be applied to awards.
The index then was 15.6 per cent but, when the board considered the review report in October, it applied the then rate of 16.7 per cent.
The committee had particular regard to two matters: significant national and global inflation in the three years from April 2021 and superior courts decisions’ concerning the proper approach to assessing damages in multiple injuries cases.
The committee was unable to do any “meaningful analysis” of court awards under the 2021 guidelines. This was because delay between commencement and trial proceedings to which they applied meant there were very few court decisions made under them.
The committee adhered to legal advice that, as with the original guidelines, the most comparable jurisdictions to which it should have regard in fixing award values were Northern Ireland, England and Wales.
The 16.7 per cent increase means the maximum €550,000 general damages under the 2021 guidelines for the most serious injuries, such as quadriplegia, will rise to about €642,000.
Awards for injuries resulting in psychiatric damage will range from €17,500 to €198,000 depending on factors including severity of the damage and prognosis. Awards for back injuries range from €585 for the most minor to €350,000 for the most severe.
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