Road Accidents: No-fault Liability in France

French delict law had two basic principles. Under article 1382 of the Civil Code, people were liable to pay compensation for their acts which caused harm to others when they were at fault. Under article 1384, paragraph 1, they were also liable for the harm caused by things in their custody. To begin with, the courts took the view that the driver of a car was liable for injuries caused in a car accident under article 1382. His driving was an ‘act’ which had caused harm to another. Therefore the victim of the accident had to prove that the driver was at fault. But this was difficult, and French law did not make it compulsory for drivers to carry insurance for injuries to third parties until 1958.

In decisions in the Jand’heur case (1927 and 1930), the highest French court, the Cour de cassation decided to apply article 1384 to road accidents − the harm was caused by a thing, the car. As a result, the keeper of the car, the person who had custody over it (for example, the person in charge of the chauffeur) was liable. The Jand’heur decision established that the law would presume that the keeper was liable for the harm caused by the thing, unless he or she proved that the harm had been caused either by the act of the victim or some unforeseen external cause. This made it easier for the victim to get compensation. The rule was based not on the idea of fault, but on the idea that the car created risks of harm to others and so the person who created the risk should pay compensation for the harm that occurred.

In Jand’heur, a little girl, Lise Jand’heur, was injured when a lorry mounted the pavement and hit her. Her parents were not able to prove that the driver was at fault. But she was able to get compensation under article 1384 of the Civil Code against the company that ran the lorry, because the thing under its control (the lorry) had caused the injury, and the company was unable to show that this had happened due to some totally external cause.