Articles by Editor,Matt Strudwick

Business

Aristocrat owners of glamping site who starred in TV's Four in a Bed are sued for £700,000 after guest broke his back on a zipwire

The aristocrat owners of a glamping site who starred in Four in a Bed are being sued for £700,000 after a guest broke his back on a zipwire. Guy and Alison Lubbock run Adhurst Yurts, a boutique off-grid glamping operation set in ancient woodland within a 500-acre Victorian estate surrounding the Grade II-listed stately home Adhurst St Mary, near Petersfield, Hampshire. The high-class yurts cost £500 for a weekend and boast 'hygge' interiors with clawfoot baths, iron bedsteads and chaise longues, while activities available onsite include bespoke bushcrafting, fly fishing and wild food events, as well as a zipwire. But the couple are now being targeted with a legal action after a father of two broke his spine while playing with his children on the zipwire at Adhurst in October 2022. London recruitment consultant Jonathan Sharpe, 36, is seeking over £700,000 in compensation, claiming his life and career have been badly impacted by the injury, which he says he suffered when the zipline broke, causing him to fall 'onto his buttocks'. But lawyers for the glampsite owners, despite admitting fault for the accident, are hotly disputing the amount of damages Mr Sharpe is seeking. Lawyers for Mr Sharpe say in documents filed with London's High Court that he paid £1,100 to stay at the glamp site with his two young children, having pre-booked the break in July 2022. 'On 20 October 2022, the claimant was at the campsite and was using the zip line with his children,' the documents state. 'The claimant used the zip line, as did his son, who was aged five at the time. The claimant then went on the zip line with his two-year-old daughter and, as he stepped off the zip line platform, the zip line broke. The claimant fell from the platform onto his buttocks. 'As a consequence of the incident, the claimant suffered a L1 burst fracture. He has been experiencing psychiatric symptoms and pain since the incident.' A burst fracture involves one of the vertebrae making up the spine collapsing in multiple directions. The L1 vertebra, which is midway down the back at the top of the kidneys, is one of the most common locations for burst fractures, due to its placement at the transition from the rigid thoracic spine to the more flexible lumbar spine. Lawyers acting for Mr Sharpe, of Ashvale Road, Tooting, say 'that the facts surrounding the incident speak for themselves'. He is also suing the couple's business insurers, NFU Mutual Insurance Ltd, with his lawyers claiming that the insurance company made an 'admission of liability...via email on 6 March 2023'. In their shared defence to the action, Mr and Mrs Lubbock and their insurers confirm that liability for the accident is conceded. 'It is admitted the claimant suffered some injury as a consequence of the accident, the nature, extent and prognosis for which is in issue,' they add, also insisting it was the wooden handle of the zip line which broke, rather than the line itself as Mr Sharpe claims. 'It is denied that the zip line broke. The cause of the claimant's fall instead appears to be the failure of the wooden handle, which was found to have split after the accident. The zip line remained intact at all times.' Mr and Mrs Lubbock's lawyers also dispute the effects of the injury on Mr Sharpe and the amount of damages claimed. They say it includes claims of almost £10,000 for a post-accident first-class trip to Australia, plus £108,324.85 for 'future holiday & leisure,' based on assertions that Mr Sharpe now needs to fly first or business class rather than economy because of his injury. 'It is expressly denied the costs of first class travel to Australia are reasonably attributable to the accident,' the defence states. 'It is not admitted that the claimant has any accident-related need for business class travel.' Mr and Mrs Lubbock are also disputing some of Mr Sharpe's other claims, including £171,017.60 for future care and assistance, £92,555 for future childcare, £66,598.20 for future gardening and £69,914.41 for future decorating and DIY. 'The claimant is back working full time... it is not admitted that the claimant is unable to return to all of his previous duties, including entertaining clients, on account of the accident,' their lawyers add. 'It is not admitted that the claimant is disadvantaged on the open labour market on account of the accident.' On its website, the Adhurst Yurts management say: 'Adhurst, situated within the South Downs National Park, is a 500-acre estate owned by the sixth generation of our family. 'We offer bespoke bushcraft instruction, guided bird walks, basketry workshops, advanced fly-fishing instruction and catered wild food events. 'Adhurst provide stylish, healthy and ecologically-conscious holidays for everyone from family groups to romantic couples to holidaying pets and nature enthusiasts. 'Adhurst St Mary is the house built by our family in 1858 and lived in continuously by the family until 1993 when we sold it. It sits like an island within the estate, but is owned separately and is reached by a private driveway. 'Bonham-Carter/Lubbock archives are kept both at Hampshire County Archives and others also held privately at Adhurst Farm. Helen Bonham-Carter was born and died in the house - as was our grandmother. Helena Bonham-Carter is a cousin and has never lived in this house. 'The estate is approx 500 acres and the Grade II house is 30 acres within this. There are now seven families living in Adhurst St Mary house. In World War One, it was a military convalescence hospital and in World War Two, it was Portsmouth Girls School.' The Lubbocks are an offshoot of the Bonham-Carter family and actress Helena's relations. The Bonham Carter family has a long history, dating back to MP John Bonham Carter in the early 1800s, who was uncle to Florence Nightingale. Alongside actress Helena, ex of film director Tim Burton, with whom she had two children, other notable members of the family include Admiral Sir Stuart Sumner Bonham Carter, who served in both World Wars, General Sir Charles Bonham-Carter, former Governor of Malta and actor Crispin Bonham Carter. The family's defence to the claim has only recently been filed at the court, but the case has not yet been listed for hearing before a judge.

Technology

Oldest surviving victim of Post Office scandal, 92, FINALLY gets her payout - after husband died still worrying if they were going to run out of money

The oldest surviving victim of the Horizon scandal has heartbreakingly told how her husband died worrying whether they were going to run out of money. Betty Brown, 92, had proudly run the Annfield Plain Post Office in County Durham in the 1990s and early 2000s with her husband Oswall. But the faulty software turned the couple's dream into a nightmare with a £500 financial hole showing up just an hour after the system was switched on. It left the couple with no choice but to use £50,000 of their life savings over the years to plug the constant gaps in their accounts, having been threatened with the sack by bosses. The Browns were eventually forced out of their Post Office and into retirement in 2003 when they sold their branch at a loss. Oswall died a year later from cancer, with Mrs Brown blaming the stress on causing his death. Yesterday, 21 years after her 'life was destroyed', Mrs Brown finally received compensation for the ordeal. The former sub-postmistress said today how Oswall died worrying that they had run out of money, as she recalled one of her final conversations with her husband of 47 years. Mrs Brown, who did not face the torment of being wrongly prosecuted, said her husband died never knowing she had been given compensation and was financially secure. She would visit him every day in hospital, where, as he lay dying, he would constantly ask her whether the Post Office had been in touch. Mrs Brown said during one visit, he had turned to face the wall after she had given her usual response of "no". She told Good Morning Britain: 'He looked at the wall for five minutes then he turned around and looked at me and he said "they are never ever going to pay it. They don't want to pay it". 'And after that, he just died. But what was in his thoughts, and his dying thoughts, there was no money left.' Mrs Brown said she shouldn't have had to fight this long for compensation, and congratulated campaigner Sir Alan Bates for his multi-million-pound settlement saying he 'deserves every penny'. She told of how she had a deficit of about £500 within an hour of Horizon being switched on. 'Big money, oh dear what has happened? But the installers put it down to an incorrect figure being entered,' she said. 'But that £500 never came back. And it just increased and increased and multiplied all the time.' The glitch in the software meant the Browns were paying out at least £1,500 a week of their own money. 'The rule of the Post Office was that if you did not make good that money immediately, you were sacked. So you had to put it in,' she said. And she revealed how three senior managers had told her how to 'fiddle the figures' after warning her she was going to lose her job as 'there are too many mistakes'. But she refused, despite bosses threatening her she 'would be finished', as 'the book says you must show an honest and true picture at that point in time, and I'm not doing that'. She spoke yesterday to the BBC after receiving her settlement and declared she could now 'settle up my affairs. I can turn the heating up full blast, and that will be wonderful'.