deeteenydeeteeny wrote: ↑03 Sep 2021, 15:59Hello
I am a retired Crown Prosecutor with a continuing interest in dangerous dogs and have written and broadcast about this topic, including an article in Archbold News, the update journal that accompanies the Crown Court procedural guide called Archbold. I have been asked to write a note about a recent case involving a postman whose finger was bitten when he pushed mail through a letter box and a dog in the house bit his hand. He had been issued with a postal peg, and I believe these were introduced for postal workers in 2011, so they aren't new. However this postman wasn't using the peg although the dog had barked before he pushed the mail through the letter box. A conversation with a local postie confirms that use is intermittent. Why would that be? Are they only useful for small envelopes?
It would be interesting from your experience as to whether in a similar case (A hypothetical one), if a postperson was bitten by a dog or even cat and had not been using the postal peg, but one had been issued to him/her, would there be a good chance that the defendant (RM) could use the defence of "contributory negligence" i.e. I'm thinking they could reasonably argue that the Safe System Of Work was not followed. Harsh I know, but as prosecutor id be interested in your views if you could care to share or hypothesize.
Similarly I wondered if in such a case RM could put forward the argument of Volenti non fit injuria as by not using the peg the postperson knew the risk and seemingly volunteered to accept it? From my limited knowledge, my understanding is that in the world of H&S at work this is seldom if ever accepted as a defence?
If however no peg had been issued to the injured postperson or there is no record of one being issued, then I would suspect that would add more weight to the claim by the injured party.
Certainly an interesting subject!
On a final point, I have some large white Aylesbury ducks, who wander around my garden eating slugs etc. On occasions I've had a few posties think that they were geese and not want to get out of their van. I know geese can be very territorial, so am all for Dynamic on site risk assessment when staff make deliveries, so theres probably a lot of animal related hazards out there.
Regards
Norfolk N Chance