Hi my husband had suffered a traumatic accident in our sons garden, when he was removing some shrubs. One of the plants was within a plant support system, which consisted of a length of coiled spring wire supported by a garden cane. The support system could not be seen as it was engulfed by the plant. On attempting to lift the plant the spring recoiled straight into my husbands left eye, resulting in the eye being totally flattened.. This horrific injury has required up to date 11 operations and he is virtually blind in that eye. This accident happened in November 2006, and my son reported this to Nationwide his buildings insurer. A loss adjustor came to his property but said that no negligence could be proven therefore no claim! I realise that over 2 years have elapsed since the accident but we had no idea at the time that it was reported,the extent of the injury,David had his 11th operation yesterday. I am asking therefore if it is possible that we were badly advised by Nationwide and would my sons building insurance not include public liability? I s there anything we can do to make a claim. I really would appreciate your help. Thankyou in anticipation. Jennifer Adams

Hi Jennifer

I agree with the Loss Adjuster appointed by Nationwide. What precautions could your son have taken to prevent the accident from happening? If there were no reasonable precautions he could have taken, I cannot see that negligence can be proved.

You could look at this from a different angle. Does your son have the packaging for the coiled spring garden plant support device? If the spring was used in accordance with the users guide/precautions and there was no warning that care should be taken when handling these while gardening, could you take action against the manufacturer? You could take action because either the device had a design fault (unsafe) and/or that the packaging did not contain sufficient safety warnings about use. If the packaging suggested wearing safety glasses while using product or gardening, then this would make any case difficult.

Do you have legal expenses on your own Home Insurance Policy. Give them a phone call to see if this would cover expenses for suing the garden product company. Some legal expenses under Home Insurances can cover expenses for £50k or more for pursuing cases like yours.The cover will under the policy you had at the time of the accident and not your current policy, if you have changed policy since.

If you don't have legal expenses cover, I would suggest discussing with Citizens Advice solicitor. http://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/

Due to the time that has passed since the accident, this will obviously make this more difficult but I believe you should pursue without entering into expense you may not recover.

Huckster