Tree Liability Risk:

Question: What should an Ontario paralegal help me do if a tree limb falls and injures someone on my property?

Answer: ?

Answer: If you are dealing with a tree limb fall injury or property damage in Ontario, Bulat Paralegal Service can help you understand when liability for negligent tree maintenance may apply under the Occupier's Liability Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. O.2, and common law negligence principles requiring proof of a duty of care plus actual or constructive knowledge of a dangerous tree condition.   In practice, liability often turns on whether the owner or hired tree-care contractor knew, or ought to have known, of risk factors like broken limbs after a storm, decaying branches, or other hazards, and whether reasonable inspections and maintenance were done, because courts generally do not impose responsibility simply because a limb fell.   Bulat Paralegal Service can guide you on evidence to gather (photos, dates, weather records, inspection logs, and contractor records), what timelines may matter, and how to prepare next steps for a claim or defence, so contact (705) 664-0334 to discuss your situation today.

Liability Involving Tree Maintenance

Although trees are extensively found throughout our urban and rural landscape, the value and benefits of trees are often taken for granted. Additionally, the potential liability risks are often unappreciated or misperceived. Owners and contractors, among others, should carefully heed the potential liability risks arising from the ownership, care, or control, of trees.

The Law

Duty of Care

The basic principles of common law, particularly negligence and the legal test regarding duty of care as founded within the Donoghue v. Stevenson case (a general principles case rather than tree specific case), prescribe that property owners owe a duty to ensure that other persons and the property of others persons is reasonably safe. In Ontario, these duties are also codified the Occupier's Liability Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. O.2, whereas it is said:

Negligently Performed Maintenance

Generally, the owner of a tree, or other persons responsible for the care of a tree such as hired maintenance contractors, will be held liable for injury or damage caused by the tree only when it was known, or constructively known, that a tree failure risk was present and the owner, or other person, failed to take proper care of the tree. Accordingly, it should be viewed that the injury or damage resulted due to neglect in the care of the tree rather than as a result of inherent risks. Essentially, it is the man-made risk of negligent failure to maintain a tree rather than an inherently natural tree risk that is said to give rise to liability for injury or damage. On the point that liability arises for the negligent failure to maintain trees rather than being absolute so to include inherent risks, such concerns were addressed within the case of Hallok v. Toronto Hydro Electric System Ltd., 2003 CanLII 8519, wherein it was stated:

As such, it seems that knowledge, or constructive knowledge, of a dangerous condition is a requirement of liability for negligent maintenance of trees.  Note that "constructive knowledge" is knowledge which the law deems a person ought to have based on reasonableness.  If a reasonably diligent person would know of a dangerous condition this is "constructive knowledge" and proving actual knowledge becomes unnecessary.  Constructive knowledge is often much easier to prove than actual knowledge.  As an example, following a severe storm, a court may deem that reasonably acting property owners would inspect trees for broken branches among other dangerous conditions.  In this regard, it is important to note that intentionally avoiding the inspection of trees, among other things, and thereby choosing to remain ignorant of a dangerous condition may be deemed an act from which constructive knowledge is imposed.

Conclusion

Tree owners, or other persons who are hired to provide the care and maintenance of trees on behalf of the owners, are prescribed by law with a duty of care to reasonably ensure that the trees are maintained in a safe condition.  If a person becomes injured or if property becomes damaged by a unreasonably maintained tree, liability may arise.