Moaning Man
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By h.b. - Oct 26, 2007 - 2:01 AM
The pastime of litigation, or let's make a denuncia

EDITORIAL COMMENT

I suppose that the fashion of suing whenever you find any sort of inconvenience in life started in the United States. And then somehow, through the influence of television, I guess, it made its way to Britain.

Hard to define, you could say it’s when people try to use the law for personal gain, despite common sense clearly showing such law to be an ass.

So, now in the United States we have surgeons retiring because they are too scared to operate, just in case they get sued, and so on. It’s like an illness creeping across the western world, and looking at the way it is spreading, it must be a close relative to that other modern illness, political correctness. While laudable on many occasions and in theory, it is now sometimes taken to extremes when common sense is shown the door.

This week we heard that the British musician, Michael Oldfield, has decided to sell up shop in the U.K. and come and live in Spain. Fed up with the smoking ban, he says the regulations in Britain have become ‘ludicrous’. He says he is fed up of living in a country where the old lady who looks after the village green has to wear a luminous vest and a hard hat. I have a mental image of Miss Marple dressed in that way…

But I wonder, Will Oldfield find Spain any better?

The progressive Government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero has done a great deal to modernise the country over the past four years. New equality legislation, and the much needed dependency law for carers, are just two examples of the new modern Spain.

But I am worried that with this progress and defence of the genuinely needy, we will also get some of the other crap.

Already here in Spain there is this culture of ‘placing a denuncia’ when you feel aggrieved. If you get denounced, the best thing you can do, say some, is denounce the person who is denouncing you. And so it goes on. Can you imagine what would happen if this popular Spanish pastime became just a bit more litigatious?

But what is this story I see today from Torrevieja? A man has gone to the local Guardia Civil barracks to place a denuncia against the owner of a property in San Pedro del Pinatar, in Murcia.

According to his claim, while he was manipulating the electrical transformer of the property, in an attempt to remove the copper wire, (which it seems is easy to sell on at a good price), he suffered a severe electric shock. As a result he has lost a hand, and suffered serious injury to a leg. He claims the owner of the house was at fault, and is demanding compensation.

I will keep an eye on this case. I hope that the Spanish judiciary will ensure that common sense remains, and that this time it is moaning man who is shown the door. Watch this space.

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