‘Claims culture’ blasted by restaurants

The restaurant sector has hit out at a “spiraling claims culture” after the High Court awarded €20,000 in damages to a woman who banged her knee against the leg of a table while sitting down to dinner.

Annette O’Connor, aged 48, of The View, Larchill, Santry, Dublin, had been directed to a table in the Mullingar Park Hotel restaurant, had waited while the manager politely withdrew her chair, then sat down and injured her left knee as she pulled her chair in to the table.

She claimed that being directed to the table setting right over the leg, which was concealed by a table cloth, constituted “a trap” and negligence on the part of the hotel owners Euro Plaza Hotel Limited, which trades as the Mullingar Park Hotel.