X -v- Estate of Y (Deceased) and Axa Insurance UK plc

Advocate D. A. Corbel for the Motor Insurers' Bureau (intervening at the invitation of the Court).

On 23 rd October last year this Court, by consent of the parties to the action, made an order providing for periodical payments to be made by the second defendant ("AXA UK") to the plaintiff by way of damages for catastrophic personal injuries caused by the negligence of the first defendant while driving a motor car on 17 th April, 2010. However, operation of the order (described as "the Conditional PPO") was suspended for a period of time in order to give the Motor Insurers' Bureau ("the MIB"), of which AXA UK is a member, an opportunity to intervene.

The MIB having availed itself of the opportunity to intervene and the Court having heard submissions on its behalf and further submissions on behalf of the plaintiff and AXA UK on 10 th February this year, we made a final order substantially in the same terms as the Conditional PPO but with revised wording of the recitals in one or two respects designed, among other things, to meet certain concerns on the part of the MIB. We now give our reasons for so doing.

The key passage in our earlier judgment (for present purposes) is paragraph 32:-

(ii) These figures plainly afford a substantial degree of comfort as to the probability of AXA UK being able to meet its obligations under the proposed periodic payments order in the foreseeable future; but Mackay J.'s words of caution in Bennett are as apposite as ever today and we would not feel able, on the basis of information about AXA UK's current standing and prospects alone, to say that we are satisfied for present purposes that continuity of payment under the proposed order is "reasonably secure", given the extended period of time contemplated by that order.