Why the 2021 Personal Injuries Guidelines Still Govern Every Irish Award

Every personal injuries award made in Ireland today is assessed against the Personal Injuries Guidelines as they stood in March 2021. A revised set exists. It proposes award increases of 16.7%. It has no legal force, and as matters stand it cannot acquire any without an Act of the Oireachtas.

That is a strange position for a system that was designed to be reviewed every three years, and it is one that practitioners advising on quantum need to be able to explain precisely. This guide sets out what the statute actually requires, how the Supreme Court locked the Guidelines in place, and what the measurable consequences have been.

What section 22 actually says

The obligation on a judge is contained in section 22(1) of the Civil Liability and Courts Act 2004, as substituted by section 99 of the Judicial Council Act 2019. It requires that the court, in assessing damages in a personal injuries action, shall:

"(a) have regard to the personal injuries guidelines (within the meaning of section 2 of the Judicial Council Act 2019), and (b) where it departs from those guidelines, state the reasons for such departure in giving its decision."

Two things follow. First, this is a have regard to duty coupled with a reasons duty on departure. It is not a prohibition on departing. Second, and for the same reason, a practitioner who tells a client that the Guidelines are binding in the strict sense is overstating the position.

It is worth noting that the Judicial Council's own published FAQ material on the Guidelines overstates this too, describing judges as required to follow the award figures. If you are relying on secondary summaries rather than the statute when advising on quantum, this is the point at which you go wrong.

Delaney and the locked door

In Delaney v Personal Injuries Assessment Board [2024] IESC 10, delivered on 9 April 2024, the Supreme Court did two things that together produced the current impasse.

By a majority of four to three, it held section 7(2)(g) of the Judicial Council Act 2019 — the provision compelling the Judicial Council to adopt guidelines — to be unconstitutional. There was, in the Court's words, "no justification for taking the extraordinary step of compulsorily requiring the Judicial Council" to do so.

But by a majority of six to one, the Court held that sections 30 and 31 of the Family Leave and Miscellaneous Provisions Act 2021 had given the Guidelines independent statutory effect. The Guidelines therefore survived — and the consequence, as the commentary on the judgment put it, is that "the Guidelines cannot now be amended save by further legislation."

The Guidelines are law. The mechanism that was supposed to keep them current is not.

The revision that nobody approved

In February 2025 the Judicial Council submitted draft amended Guidelines. They proposed an increase of 16.7% to awards of damages, which would have lifted the cap for catastrophic injuries from €550,000 to €642,000.

Because of Delaney, any amendment must now be laid before the Oireachtas for approval. In July 2025 the Minister confirmed that he would not bring a resolution to the Oireachtas to approve the draft Amended Guidelines.

The 2021 Guidelines accordingly remain unchanged and in force. In Higgins v Coleman in December 2025 the court put it flatly: "The proposed amended guidelines do not have the force of law", and applied the March 2021 version.

The Chief Justice's warning

In October 2025 the Chief Justice, Donal O'Donnell, warned publicly that the failure to update the Guidelines would "put the guidelines system itself at risk". If courts and the Injuries Resolution Board increasingly depart from the figures in order to make higher awards, he said, "the guidelines will inevitably begin to fray". He described it as "simply counter-productive to seek to prevent the revision of guidelines in this system".

That is not an abstract concern. The reasons duty in section 22(1)(b) is the only thing standing between a frozen tariff and a drift back towards ad hoc assessment, and it costs a judge very little to discharge it.

What the numbers show

The Injuries Resolution Board's figures for 2025, reported in July 2026, give some measure of the pressure:

• Median award in the second half of 2025: €14,170, up 6%
• Median employer liability award: €20,600, up 27%
• Average award across 2025: €20,559, up 8%
• More than 50 awards above €100,000 in the second half of 2025, against 30 in each comparison period
• Minor-severity awards down from 86% of all awards in 2021 to 74% by the second half of 2025
• Acceptance rate 47%, down from 50%; consent rate 69%, down from 71%
• 20,077 applications, down 4% on 2024 and 35% below 2019

The falling acceptance rate is the figure to watch. It has been attributed in part to uncertainty about the revised Guidelines. A claimant who believes a higher tariff may arrive has an incentive to reject an assessment made under the current one, which pushes cost and delay back into the system the Board exists to keep cases out of.

What is proposed, and what is not yet law

On 20 January 2026 the General Scheme of the Judicial Council (Amendment) Bill 2026 was published. It would, among other things:

• Increase the review period from three years to five
• Require the Judicial Council to consult the Injuries Resolution Board
• Require published comparative damages research no later than the date a draft is submitted
• Provide for deemed adoption of guidelines once the Oireachtas has approved the necessary resolutions, with a reconsideration mechanism where a draft is rejected

Be careful how you describe this. A General Scheme is a pre-legislative document. Pre-legislative scrutiny concluded in February 2026, and as far as can be established from the public record nothing has been enacted. Until it is, the position for advising clients is unchanged: March 2021 figures, a have regard to duty, and a reasons duty on departure.

Where this sits in your CPD

Quantum advice based on a superseded tariff — or on a proposed tariff that does not yet exist in law — is a client care problem before it is anything else. The Law Society of Ireland's 2026 cycle requires 25 hours, of which a minimum of three must fall in the client care and professional standards category, and advising accurately on what the law currently is sits squarely inside it. Our guide to solicitor CPD requirements in Ireland sets out the full category breakdown, and the legal CPD guide for Ireland and the UK covers how the Irish cycle compares with the SRA's continuing competence regime.

Two practical points to take away. Cite section 22(1) rather than a summary of it, because the summaries in circulation — including the Judicial Council's own — overstate the duty. And when the amended Guidelines come up in a negotiation, be able to say exactly why they do not yet bind anyone: not because they are new, but because Delaney made amendment a matter for the Oireachtas and the Oireachtas has not acted.