The family of a Norwich driver seriously injured in a collision told how their lives have been 'turned upside down' by the serious injuries he received in a crash caused when an HGV driver swerved into his path.

Stephen Huish, 69, was driving on Lower Street towards Billingford near Diss on the A143, when he failed to see cars ahead had stopped and swerved to avoid them only to collide with a Renault HGV cab coming in the opposite direction, driven by Gregory Elgood, Norwich Crown Court heard.

Hugh Vass, prosecuting, said Mr Elgood, 33, was left with 'life changing injuries' as he suffered a stroke and multiple fractures and injuries.

The father of four, was air lifted to Addebrooke's Hospital, in Cambridge, before being transferred to the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital and has so far had to undergo 11 operations and still faces further surgery.

Mr Vass said Mr Elgood has had to learn to walk again as well as suffering memory problems and said: 'The damage to Mr Elgood was life changing.'

Huish, of Baxter Road, Dereham, admitted careless driving on July 10, last year and was fined £750 and had eight penalty points on his licence.

Judge Moore accepted the accident was caused by a 'momentary inattention' and said: 'That in no way undoes the terrible consequences of that moment of inattention.'

Claire Davies, for Huish, said: 'He accepts his guilt and his responsibility for the accident that day. He accepts his driving was careless.'

She said he had since given up his HGV licence.

After the case Mr Elgood's fiancee, Selina Starsky, who was in court with his family to see him sentenced, said that for Huish the case was over but for her partner he had to live every day with the serious injuries he received: 'Our whole life has been turned upside down.'

She said Mr Elgood, from Norwich, who worked as a Master technician with Norfolk Truck and Van Ltd in School Lane, Norwich, had just proposed to her a week before the crash but said they were still planning on getting married next year.

She said that he had offered to pick up a truck the day of the crash as a favour and said: 'He was in the wrong place at the wrong time.'