FAI General Insurance v Curtin

In the case of FAI General Insurance v Curtin, the plaintiff, Curtin, sought compensation from the defendant, FAI General Insurance, for damages arising from an accident. The dispute centred on whether Curtin was entitled to compensation for psychiatric injury sustained following a collision with a broken-down vehicle on the road. Curtin argued that the defendant's insured, who was driving the broken-down vehicle, owed a duty of care to Curtin to prevent such an accident, and that Curtin's psychiatric injury was a reasonably foreseeable consequence of the breach of that duty. The case was heard by the Supreme Court of New South Wales.

The court was required to determine several legal issues, including whether there existed a duty of care owed by the driver of the broken-down vehicle to Curtin, whether Curtin was in a sufficiently proximate relationship with the driver to claim damages, and whether Curtin's psychiatric injury was a reasonably foreseeable consequence of the driver's negligence. The court also had to consider whether personal injury, including psychiatric injury, could be claimed in such circumstances.

The court held that the driver of the broken-down vehicle owed a duty of care to Curtin, given that Curtin was likely to be in the vicinity of the vehicle. It was held that psychiatric injury was a foreseeable consequence of a collision with a broken-down vehicle, and that the driver's negligence in leaving the vehicle unattended breached the duty of care owed to Curtin. The court also found that Curtin's psychiatric injury was a direct result of the collision and thus recoverable as damages. The court awarded Curtin damages for her psychiatric injury.

The Supreme Court of New South Wales ordered that FAI General Insurance pay Curtin the sum of $120,000 in damages for her psychiatric injury, in addition to costs. The court found that Curtin's injury was a direct result of the defendant's insured's negligence, and that the psychiatric injury was a reasonably foreseeable consequence of the breach of duty.