Two cases from the 1800s – one involving a stolen ostrich and one a borrowed horse that fell into one of Grahamstown’s potholes – have established that you can sue for damages even when driving a vehicle not belonging to you, says a Daily Dispatch report.

The Eastern Cape High Court (Grahamstown) has given Tavcor Motors in Port Elizabeth the go-ahead to sue another company, Parmalat, for damages done to one of its client’s car after a collision with a Parmalat vehicle. Tavcor alleges that the collision happened as a result of the negligence of the driver of the Parmalat vehicle. But Parmalat took the technical point that Tavcor did not have the standing to sue for damages to a vehicle that did not belong to it even if the car was in its care at the time.

But Judges Clive Plasket and Selby Mbenenge were referred all the way back to cases from the 1800s that suggest otherwise.

Plasket said there was a ‘line of cases that stretch back prior to Union’ in which the courts consistently held that – in certain circumstances – a possessor, rather than an owner, may have standing to recover damages.

Plasket found Tavcor had contacted the owner when the vehicle was damaged and had agreed to repair it at its cost. By doing so it ‘assumed the risk’ and had the right to sue another party for damages.

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