Matthew Trusch
Head of Personal Injury
English
Councils must make sure that public places they’re in charge of are safe, to prevent members of the public from suffering injuries – whether this is a pavement, park, road or building.
If you sustained injuries from an accident in public, or on council property, and you believe it happened as a result of the council’s negligence, get in touch to see if you could be eligible to make a claim for compensation. Our Personal Injury lawyers are experts in these claims and have achieved thousands of pounds in compensation for people against councils and local authorities.
To claim compensation, we will need to prove that your injury has been caused by the council’s actions or failings in their duty of care to you. Get in touch with us for a Free Case Assessment, where we’ll find out about your situation and let you know if you could be eligible to make a claim. We could even deal with your claim on a No Win, No Fee basis.
Fill in the form below to get in touch with one of our dedicated team members, or call our team today on: 0800 260 5010
We're rated‘Excellent’
Even if the accident was partly your fault, you can help us prove that the council could have prevented your injuries by:
If you don’t see your situation here, we’d still advise you to get in touch. Our solicitors are some of the UK’s best Personal Injury lawyers and if we can take your claim forward, we will find out as much we can to work towards the best compensation for you.
We specialise in serious injuries, as we know these can have a devastating impact on your life. Not only do they cause you a huge amount of pain, but they can have many knock-on effects in your life, such as loss of income, travel expenses to appointments, and an effect on your ability to socialise and perform day-to-day tasks.
Our Personal Injury solicitors will take all of these impacts into consideration when we investigate your claim and negotiate your final compensation, including any multiple injuries you might have. Here are some examples of injuries that people have made claims for, where we have recovered thousands of pounds in compensation:
Sometimes, injuries can lead to other conditions and complications. Compensation can help you get back to the quality of life you had before your injuries, if you’re suffering from:
We’ve got a great track record claiming thousands of pounds compensation for our clients against councils and local authorities.
We try and make the law straightforward by avoiding legal jargon. We’ll keep you informed throughout your claim.
We work with world-class doctors, surgeons, therapists, physiotherapists and more. We can visit you at home, in hospital, or speak to you virtually.
We’re one of the UK’s leading Personal Injury claims solicitors. We are also recognised as national experts in legal directories such as Legal 500.
The process for making a claim against the council will vary slightly, depending on what kind of claim you make, but here is an overview of what to expect.
You get in touch with our expert solicitors for a Free Claims Assessment. We’ll get as much information as we can about your situation and let you know if you could make a claim against the council. If we think a third party could be held responsible that is not the council (e.g. a private business), we’ll let you know the next steps.
We’ll contact the council or authority and ask them to admit responsibility for your injuries.
This could be the local authority if your child was injured in public, eg in a school, shop or playground. There may even be a mix of people who were responsible so we will investigate this properly e.g. by getting in touch with another driver in a road traffic accident.
If the injuries are serious, we know it’s important to start recovery as soon as possible, and private healthcare can be expensive if you need it. We could ask the council to make early interim payments for this, before we settle your claim.
We’ll gather evidence to maximise the amount of compensation you could get. This might include CCTV footage of the accident, photographs, witness statements or an independent medical expert’s assessment.
We’ll use our expertise to negotiate with the council to get you the best settlement possible. Once this has been agreed, we’ll try and get the compensation to as soon as possible, or help you set up a Personal Injury trust if you’re claiming for an injury on behalf of a child under 18.
The exact amount of compensation you could get will vary, but we’ve secured millions of pounds for our clients over the years who have made claims against the council. We’ll take into account how severe the injury has been, and any long-term impact it might have.
Compensation could help you pay for:
You usually have 3 years from the day you suffered your injury to start a claim for compensation. If you developed a certain condition as a result of your injury, the time limit is 3 years from the date you were diagnosed with this.
If you’re making a claim on behalf of a child, you usually have until their 18th birthday. We advise you get in touch with us as soon as you can, because we may be able to get them early rehabilitation to get them on the road to recovery.
If you’re 18 or over, you can make a claim for an accident you were involved in before you turned 18. You have until your 21st birthday to do this.
It’s also possible to make a claim on behalf of someone that doesn’t have the mental capacity to make decisions for themselves – there is no time limit on doing this. If you’re unsure on whether the person does ‘lack capacity’, our Court of Protection team can help.
Councils, local authorities and businesses have a legal duty to protect members of the public who are visiting their premises or accessing public places. This includes places like roads, pavements, shops, parks and restaurants. They must regularly inspect and maintain public places to ensure they are in a safe condition, so if you are injured in a council-owned space, they could be legally responsible for your injury.
Councils must show that they conducted regular safety inspections and acted quickly enough to fix any issues, e.g. pavements in a state of disrepair. Our expert Personal Injury lawyers will do everything in their power during your claim to prove that these standards were not met, so we can secure the compensation you deserve.
All UK employers, including councils, have a legal duty of care towards their employees, to ensure people are given adequate training on health and safety in the workplace. They must monitor the working environment to make sure it is safe and deal with any risks or hazards promptly to prevent injuries.
Call us on 0800 260 5010 or request a callback to discuss your case with us for free.
We might be able to deal with your claim on a No Win No Fee basis, depending on your situation. That means you won’t pay anything unless we win your case, taking any financial stress out for you.
We’ll ask the person or company responsible to make early, interim payments for you if you need quick rehabilitation or support after a Personal Injury. The Rehabilitation Code encourages all parties to work together in this way. This means that you can focus on your recovery, even if your claim hasn’t been settled yet.
If your child is injured whilst trespassing, i.e. they’ve unlawfully entered a premises, the owner of the premises may in some circumstances still be responsible for their safety. It’s accepted in the law that some parts of premises (trampolines, climbing frames, low buildings, sheds) might be an allurement to children. In those circumstances, the occupier of the premises may have a responsibility and duty of care even if the child unlawfully trespassed. Any dangerous parts of premises (e.g. fragile rooves, unsafe play equipment) should be cordoned off and have warning signs displayed.
Get in touch with our lawyers, who can give you expert advice on whether you could be eligible to claim compensation.
If you contact us about making a Personal Injury claim, we’ll always ask you if you did everything you could to prevent you or your child from getting injured.
As experts in their field, our specialist Personal Injury lawyers will gather all the evidence they can. We’ll get an independent medical expert to assess your injuries and any knock-on effects they’ve had. This will give you the best chance at securing the maximum compensation. Most personal injury claims are settled outside of court, but if you do end up having to go to Court, we’ll support you and give our expert advice all the way through.
Even if the other party – a local council, school or road user for example – was only partly responsible, and you may have been at fault somehow, you could still be entitled to compensation, so get in touch with us today.
In the UK, many people decide to claim compensation after being injured due to an accident which was someone else’s fault. In law, this is called a Personal Injury Claim. The most common of these accidents include road traffic accidents and accidents at work.
When you’re claiming compensation, the process can sometimes take longer than you’d planned. Whether it’s due to things taking longer in terms of settling on an amount, or if the process is just taking a while because of these services being overwhelmed, sometimes, things don’t go according to the timelines you expected.
With former Justice Secretary, Jack Straw, recently speaking out against the personal injury industry and claiming that a "compensation culture" exists in the UK, Nicola Hardy, a Senior Associate Solicitor at Simpson Millar explains, soft tissue injuries are an area that has come under particular scrutiny from officials.
Fill in the form below to get in touch with one of our dedicated team members, or call our team today on: 0800 260 5010
