Cork County Council pays out 'extraordinary' €5.6m in footpath compensation claims

Labour Party TD's Sean Sherlock said: "This is an extraordinary amount of money paid out by the council and underlines the need to ensure that our footpaths are in a safe and proper state."

One of the biggest local authorities in the country has paid out more than €5.6m in compensation related to injuries sustained on footpaths over the past four years.

Cork County Council confirmed that the sum was paid out in relation to 233 claims made between 2019 and 2022. In response to a Freedom of Information (FOI) request made by Labour Party TD's Sean Sherlock's office, the local authority said that it paid €1.8m related to 76 claims in 2019 and €1.69m in relation to 69 claims in 2020.

The amount paid out dropped to €930,000 in relation to 42 claims in 2021, but €1.25m was paid out for 46 claims last year, the figures show. Mr Sherlock called the sums "extraordinary", saying that local authorities had to refocus on the safety of footpaths.

"This is an extraordinary amount of money paid out by the council and underlines the need to ensure that our footpaths are in a safe and proper state. If we want people to walk more, we have to ensure the footpaths are there. We need a back-to-basics approach," the Cork East TD said.

Cork County Council said in its reply to the FOI that the quarterly reports it receives from its insurers "do provide statistical analysis in relation to number and value of settlements paid by it in a given year".

However, "they do not provide a breakdown by electoral division and they do not provide reason for payout on individual claims", it said.

It was revealed last year that almost €150m had been paid out by local authorities across the country in relation to injuries sustained on footpaths. Almost €50m was paid out by Dublin City Council between 2017 and the middle of 2022, figures released to the Irish Independent showed.

That council saw almost 5,000 claims made against it in relation to footpaths in the period. Four local authorities in Dublin paid out more than €66m between them overall.

What's your view on this issue?

You can tell us here

That €150m sum did not include either Cork City Council or Cork County Council, who did not provide figures at the time for the five-year period, meaning the true amount was likely to be substantially higher.

The local government sector is insured in Ireland by IPB Mutual Insurance (IPB). According to various solicitors' websites, claims are made in relation to footpath sustained injuries because of various factors such as incorrectly laid slabs, potholes, kerbs that are too high, and misaligned or raised kerbs.

Active travel and environmental campaigners have also warned about the danger arising from illegal parking by cars and other vehicles on footpaths that are not designed to take such loads, leading to cracks and splits regularly occurring.

There have been regular calls for gardaí and local authorities to enforce laws against such illegal parking, especially around sporting events where footpaths are used as convenient spaces to leave cars for hours at a time.

Earlier this year, residents and businesses of Little Island in Cork, which has around 18,000 people living, working, and visiting the area every day, warned that the state of the footpaths is a major source of concern locally.