The Church of Ireland will not have to contribute towards a €90,000 (£78,000) settlement awarded to a child who was left with facial scars after falling into a bramble at a church-owned centre in Dublin.
The incident happened in April 2018 when three-year-old Cara Faye O’Brien O’Keeffe was playing at Deerpark Montessori school, which operates from St Mary’s Church Parish Centre in Howth.
The child suffered cuts and abrasions to her face after coming into contact with a bramble and was subsequently awarded €90,000 in a settlement approved by the High Court in 2022.
According to The Irish Times, the school later sought an indemnity or contribution towards the settlement from the representative body of the Church of Ireland.
However, High Court judge Tony O’Connor has rejected the application after finding that the church had not breached its duty of care.
Evidence indicated that the bramble shoot had emerged only in the days before the accident and after maintenance had been carried out in the garden.
The judge found the church had maintained the area appropriately and said expecting it to have warned the school about the individual shoot “tests any sense of reasonableness”.
“One cannot expect the church to alert the school to the potential for a bramble shoot,” he said.
The court also heard that the school carried out daily inspections of the garden before children were allowed to play there.
