Walking on your land

As someone who has first hand experience with losses from Neospora, I'd be asking them to vacate

I’m getting closer to the town the whole time with developments coming out my direction. Suck to the teeth of people coming out walking with dogs. I’m a sheep farmer so had instances of Sheep killed and ran heavy in lamb. More and more are becoming very belligerent and lack of respect for property owner including using a field right beside my parents house.

Had 2 lads from the Village out walking the dogs and doing a bit of hunting, I challenged them on why they were on my land only to be told they were in the local Gun club and didn't need my permission.

Go in and walk around their garden with a pet cow and see how they would like it.

I know, it's not the same thing. ....

I wasn't sure as it was a place I got from an Uncle and thought maybe he had given them the ok in the past. Turned out they were chancing it and they were not even members of the Club having been refused entry

This is how i handle trespassers on my land OP...

Or unless you have a building/other structure on your land that isn't identified with warning signs and fenced to appropriate standards to prevent possible injury?

A Dr from a nearby town to a property I own, decided my land and woods were a nice place to do some shooting. He had an accident - I have always presumed he stumbled, as it's rough ground - and managed to shoot himself - close range blast from a shotgun. I gather he nearly bled out before rescue arrived and he could be taken on an at least 1hr trip to the nearest major hospital.

I was half expecting some solicitor to get in contact and accuse me of not removing every rock and filling every hole so some trespasser poaching wouldn't trip.

Not a word.

The law on uninvited guests trespassers is quite clear. You owe no duty of care to them. You may not do anything to deliberately harm them but you being negligent is not in play as you owe them ''no duty of care''.

Minors U16 ( unaccompanied I think but not sure) are not included in the legislation. The only other provisio may be regulations such as around uncovered slurry tanks, if you had no covers on agitation points or when building works are in play.

The legislation has proven very robust. It is not just used in farmland, it has also stopped cases where nefarious activity was being carried out and an individual hurt themselves. The legal people tried to drive a coach and four through it but any case where it applies has been lost.

The two most high profile was a person who slipped down a cliff and broke bones where a high court judge ( the first test case) gave damages but these were overturned by the Supreme Court.

In another case a person slipped taking a shortcut out of a car park that was regularly used and no damages were awarded( I think this was a circuit court case)

Negligence was deliberately excluded from the legislation (lawyers lobbied for it to be included) but the legislation is clear it's ''no duty of care'' as long as you do not deliberately attempt to harm people. Deliberate harm would be where you dug a hole on a path and covered it with grass or bushes so that it became a trap or if you connected a fence wire to mains electricity to stop people entering your land.

There is no onus on you to provide signs or fence off area that may be dangerous unless it is covered by regulation.

I wish people who don't understand the legislation would stop interpreting it.

I think that was up above the lake in Glendalough where Coilte had put in railway sleeper type pathways on the walks/trails and the case went against her

Eventually, It had to be appealed.

the woman in that case had a solicitor husband which is why I'm guessing it made it to court...but I still wouldn't like to pay for a court defence.

I cannot quite read the Examiner article as I do not subscribe. I could glean parts of it but not all. As I pointed out earlier minors U16 are not included in the legislation. However part of the reply was incorrect.

In the trespassers legislation ( and it's is in force nearly twenty years now) there is only two type of people catered for Guests, and uninvited Guests( trespassers for the want of a better word). A Guest a someone like a friend you invited for a cup of tea, the postman, the miller rep or the silage contractor etc. A traveling salesman is not a guest neither is someone wandering your fields. Signs are not necessary.

On Gunclubs I neither give permission nor do I go shouting and roaring at them. They are uninvited guests.

Like everyone that has any sense I pay in

And the fact it was the women husband was a solicitor would have influenced the judges decision as well.

It no irony, in the twenty ish years since this legislation nobody has successfully sued a farmer while walking on his land.

I pay my insurance if there an issue I will hand it over to them. There is no way issue and no need to consider a lad walking you land as a liability from an injury point of view as long as he is uninvited.

This is totally different to open countryside and by extension private property as opposed to regulated areas. For instance construction sites and car parks owe a duty of care to those that are in the vicinity of them. A farmer or any private property owner dose not. They may not deliberately harm them but they do not owe them a duty of care.

No I am not missing the point. You do not understand the legal phrase about ''no duty of care'' means you being negligent is not an issue. The way the legislation is phrased if someone list an eye to a briar there is no way they would win compensation, on the harrow the claimant has to prove that you deliberately left it there with the intention of injuring someone.

There has being no such cases won in court where the claimant was an uninvited guest. On the spiked railing, the boy was a six year old so is not covered by the act as he is s minor.

The trespasser was a minor not covered by the act. As well spiked fences around a property could be considered similar to putting glass.into concrete on the top of a wall to discourage/ prevent access. Putting glass on top of a wall is a deliberate act whereby you will injure someone if they attempt to climb the wall.

Again he was a minor not covered by the act.

It is not because he was a six year old boy. Age isn't directly relevant for the Act. The judge made the decision because there was a history of kids regularly trying to retrieve balls and the owner knew about that activity. Therefore it brought the risk itself into the higher category - "reckless disregard".

Just FYI, the 1995 Act only applies to the state of the property itself. So it does not apply in relation to any activity that you do on that property. Additionally, there are 3 categories under the act rather than 2.

What you need is the anti-climb paint, along top of gate.

It never dries.

I'm not Jack Reacher. I'm John Rambo, so I set horrific traps that kill & maim trespassers.

we had hunters and hounds on our land and one guy took two dogs and and spade and must have dug out a fox on our land and never asked permission, the cheek of some people