LIABILITY FOR WORK CAUSED PSYCHIATRIC ILLNESS

In order to recover compensation for a psychiatric condition allegedly caused in the workplace, a worker, pursuant to the Safety Rehabilitation and Compensation Act 1988 (C'th) must establish that the condition comprised an "injury" within the meaning of the Act. To establish that, it is necessary to show that the employment, or employment factors, was a contributing factor to the disease or condition.

Frequently Comcare and other government agencies, suggest that as there was no obvious fault in the workplace system, the workplace could not have contributed or caused the particular psychiatric condition. This seeks to introduce the concept of "fault" into the relevant causation test. Although changes are being considered by the Federal Government at the moment, the Act in its present form does not require any such proof.

The Federal Court in the matter of Rodriguez v Telstra Corporation Limited confirmed that all that was necessary was for the employee to show that the workplace had been a material contributing factor to the development of the employee's major depressive disorder. It was not necessary that the employee showed that there was a special, or unusual or wrongful factor of his employment which was the contributing factor. Once it was shown that the employment contributed to the development of the depression, that was sufficient.

It is a timely reminder that in seeking evidence about the contribution or causation component, the focus should be on proving, not that the employer necessarily did anything wrong, but that the workplace factors caused or contributed to the illness.

DISCLAIMER

These personal injury law articles were published with the express permission of Stacks/The Law Firm. Please note that the information was correct at the time of publication, but personal injury law is subject to legislation changes from time to time and thus it is recommended that you contact a Stacks/Goudkamp lawyer should you have any questions relating to any of the topics above.