Day 190 - 23 Nov 95 - Page 23
1 This is reported in [1939] 2 All ER, 688.
2
3 "A motor cyclist was killed in a collision
4 between his motor cycle and a lorry driven by a
5 servant of the defendants. The driver was the
6 only person who could give evidence as to how
7 the accident happened. This driver made certain
8 statements at the inquest, and in this action
9 the plaintiff (the father of the motor cyclist)
10 sought to administer an interrogatory to the
11 defendant council asking that the defendant
12 council should admit that their driver made
13 certain statements at the inquest. It was not
14 suggested that the driver was an agent of the
15 council to make any admission:-
16 HELD: as the admissions of the driver
17 would not be evidence against the defendant
18 council in the absence of proof that the driver
19 was an agent to make them, the proposed
20 interrogatory must be disallowed."
21
22 My Lord, the judgments, again, are short, beginning at
23 page 689, letter F of the judgment of
24 Sir Wilfrid Greene M.R.
25
26 MR. MORRIS: Sorry -----
27
28 MR. RAMPTON: 689, the next page in the bundle.
29
30 "This appeal must be allowed. The interrogatory
31 which the plaintiff seeks to administer to the
32 defendant corporation is one asking that the
33 defendant corporation should admit that their
34 lorry driver made certain statements at the
35 inquest. It is not suggested that the lorry
36 driver was the agent of the defendants to make
37 admissions, and admissions by the lorry driver
38 would not be evidence against the defendant in
39 the absence of proof to that effect.
40 The judge thought that the case was really
41 similar to that of Sloan v. Hanson, decided in
42 this court. In that case, this court confirmed
43 an order of Asquith J., who had allowed an
44 interrogatory asking whether or not the
45 defendant had at an inquest made certain
46 statements which were set out in conjunction
47 with the interrogatory. In that case, the
48 person who it was sought to interrogate was the
49 defendant himself, and the admission which the
50 answer to that interrogatory would have elicited
51 would have been an admission by the defendant
52 himself. In the present case, however, the only
53 result of the answer to the interrogatory would
54 be, not an admission by the defendants as to the
55 way in which their driver was driving, but an
56 admission by the defendants that on a particular
57 occasion their servant, not being an agent to
58 make an admission, made a particular statement,
59 which is a different thing altogether."
60
