ANOTHER VOICE
The insuperable problems of putting a price on everything
AUBERON WAUGH
Envy is a sterile and odious emotion which we should avoid in ourselves and punish severely in others. Half the avoid- able misery in the world is caused by the exploitation of envy, whether genuine idealists are the exploiters or cynical politi- cians and demagogues in the vulgar press. The other half is probably caused by guilt, similarly exploited, whether from the pul- pits or in the quality newspapers. Although a certain amount of guilt — in the sense of shame at our own good fortune when contemplating the misfortunes of the world — is wholesome enough in small quanti- ties, I feel it should always be taken with a pinch of salt and in private. Anyone trying to manipulate it, in whatever direction, should be regarded with great caution.
Having said which, I must also own up to having felt a twinge of envy when I read about the Bournemouth fitter, Mr Robert Coombs, who trod on a sleeping cat in one of the public gardens for which Bourne- mouth is justly famous, and was awarded £59,054 compensation in the High Court. As a result of injuries received on that occasion in 1985, Mr Coombs has given up all gainful employment, taken to wearing a corset, and still complains of back ache. But what lifted it from being a run-of-the- mill misfortune such as any of us might suffer at any time to being a case for compensation was that Christchurch bor- ough council had neglected to cut the grass on the path where the cat was sleeping.
If the grass had been cut, he would not have received a penny. I suppose he might have sued the cat's owner, if she could be traced, but she might not have the money available — few pensioners are very thrifty — and in any case I have a theory that cat-owners are not liable, as dog-owners are, for any devastation caused by their cat's trespass. In fact, cats are incapable of trespass, being allowed to exist in a state of prelapsarian innocence, probably because the law reckons there is not much money to be made out of them.
Or again, there might have been no cat there. It is all the luck of the draw. Mr Coombs might have tripped over his own shoelaces, in which case Christchurch borough council would not have had to pay him a penny, although I suppose he might have tried suing the makers of his shoelaces, if they could be traced. But the point I am trying to make is that the requirement to establish negligence offers an entirely random element of luck which transmutes what would otherwise be a misfortune, and nothing more, into a misfortune plus glorious tax-free bonanza.
The most elementary principles of equity would seem to make it absurdly unfair that some people should be extravagantly com- pensated for a misfortune while others should receive nothing. Even the principle of negligence applies only in cases where damages are recoverable. If the cat's own- er could be proved liable, there would still be no joy for Mr Coombs if, as I suspect she might do, she turned out to be a penniless old age pensioner; but if it turned out to be an immensely wealthy interior decorator of peculiar tastes (as a few cat-owners undoubtedly are) Mr Coombs would be laughing — or at any rate moaning — all the way to the bank. Where is the fairness in that?
A scene sticks in my memory from Marjorie Wallace's excellent book about the thalidomide case, after Harold Evans, with almost unbelievable bravery, wrote a leader in the Sunday Times urging Distil- lers to pay compensation to the victims. No sooner had Distillers, snarling in dis- appointed rage, agreed to do so than the figures awarded were announced in the special nursing home which had been built for them: Sharon gets £35,000, Tracy gets £42,625, Wayne gets £89,203 but Bobby, little Bobby Blufeld, gets — wait for it folks — £183,964! Instead of cheering and congratulating little Bobby Blufeld on his greater award, the horrid children turned on him and beat him up so severely that he had to be removed from the nursing home and looked after separately.
I cannot remember exactly what moral Wallace drew from this unhappy episode — possibly that more compensation should be paid by Distillers to Bobby Blufeld, for his further injuries, and to all the other victims in recognition of their trauma at not receiving more. My own reaction and I played with the idea of writing a novel about it at the time — was that `Let's face it, Dad, you've got a drink problem.' sympathy for life's unfortunates should be kept separate from those other great bul- warks of our happy society, the Father Christmas and Football Pools syndromes.
If we carry this perception with us into the present heartrending examples of the child haemophilia victims who are now dying from Aids as a result of receiving untreated blood transfusions from the National Health, we see that once again the question of compensation hangs on whether or not there was negligence. Once again, the misfortune will be just as great whether negligence can be proved or whether it cannot and the vicarious munifi- cence which passes for generosity of spirit in our collective age urges us all to tell Mr Clarke to pay up. It is on the question of amount that doubts begin to creep in.
A memorable scene in one of Anthony Powell's novels has a character asking another character how much he should tip someone who has saved his life. In this instance we should ask ourselves how much we should tip someone we have inadvertently, as it were, killed. The ques- tion is complicated by the fact that the haemophilia victims would presumably have died if they had not received blood transfusions. The National Health Service, in attempting to keep them alive in one way merely ensured that they died in another. It had nothing to gain by either dispensation, and can scarcely merit punishment for doing its best. But if negligence is established, what is the appropriate compensation for a life? The children are unlikely to enjoy whatever sum they receive, but others might.
Even this question is complicated by a possible claim from parents for mental distress caused by the death of their children. What is an appropriate sum for this unhappiness? The Government need be in no doubt that if any such claim went to court, a British jury's estimate of an appropriate sum would run to millions rather than to tens of thousands. Perhaps it is the result of all the junk money sloshing around on video display units between London, Tokyo, Sydney, Hong Kong, Seoul and New York: perhaps it is the result of a shift of wealth and power to the great corporations and state institutions; perhaps it is the result of a general moral degeneracy brought about by easy money and the bonanza ethos, but the confusion in British minds seems unravellable.
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