Welcome to the latest edition of HWL Ebsworth’s National Workers Compensation Quarterly Review.
We are delighted to bring you another series of articles reflecting recent legal and other industry developments within the workers compensation sector across different States and Territories.
We hope that you will enjoy this edition of our Quarterly Review and encourage you to pass it on to any colleagues to whom it would also be of interest. If anyone would like to be added to our direct mailing list, please contact marketing@hwle.com.au.
ACT
A guide to client legal privilege in the workers compensation context – An ACT perspective
To read more, click here.
New South Wales
Section 151Z – A right to indemnity or a right in doubt?
The New South Wales Court of Appeal recently delivered a decision casting doubt over the circumstances in which an employer may seek an indemnity for the workers compensation payments it has made to, for, and on behalf of, an injured worker.
To read more, click here.
Queensland
Employers appeal rights still gone!
The Industrial Court has upheld the decision of the Industrial Relations Commission that the Commission does not have the power to make any orders to allow an employer leave to be heard in a worker’s appeal to the Commission.
To read more, click here.
South Australia
Intended and unintended consequences
Transitional provisions of the Return to Work Act (2014) SA
Two recent decisions have highlighted what, in the first case (“Walmsley”), must have been the intention of the legislators but what in the second case (“Pennington”) must surely have been unintended.
To read more, click here.
Victoria
Accord and dissatisfaction: Pleading previous common law settlements in defence of statutory benefit proceedings
The difficulties for defendants in relying upon past common law settlements for the purpose of making estoppel-based arguments in statutory benefit claims was recently addressed in the recent Magistrates Court matter of Dusan Zubic v PPG Industries Pty Ltd.
To read more, click here.
Western Australia
All or nothing: Guarding against section 217 claims
There has been an upward trend in the number of Applications by workers at WorkCover seeking an extension of their prescribed amount for weekly compensation payments on the basis of “permanent total incapacity”. There are some areas of risk that insurers and self-insurers can watch for to reduce their exposure to what can be a significant additional claim cost.
To read more, click here.