South Australian WorkCover changes reject psychiatric permanent impairment

South Australian WorkCover changes reject psychiatric permanent impairment

October 23, 2014
The previous SA WorkCover Act discriminated against psychiatric injury. The system was scrapped but the new bill, the Return to Work Bill 2014 retains this discrimination!

56—Lump sum payments—economic loss

(1) Subject to this Act, if a worker, other than a seriously injured worker, suffers a work injury resulting in permanent impairment as assessed under Part 2 Division 5, the worker is entitled (in addition to any entitlement apart from this section) to compensation for loss of future earning capacity by way of a lump sum.

(2) An entitlement does not arise under this section if the worker’s degree of whole person impairment from physical injury is less than 5%.

(3) An entitlement does not arise under this section in relation to—

(a) a psychiatric injury or consequential mental harm

58—Lump sum payments—non-economic loss

(1) Subject to this Act, if a worker suffers a work injury resulting in permanent impairment as assessed under Part 2 Division 5, the worker is entitled (in addition to any entitlement apart from this section) to compensation for non-economic loss by way of a lump sum.

(2) An entitlement does not arise under this section if the worker’s degree of whole person impairment from physical injury is less than 5%.

(3) An entitlement does not arise under this section in relation to a psychiatric injury or consequential mental harm.

 

comments

South Australian WorkCover changes reject psychiatric permanent impairment: 2 comments

  1. Robert_Lawton Says:

    Michael – see Division 5 of Part 2 of the RTW Act.

    Robert

  2. Michael Epstein Says:

    Thanks Robert,

    In Resources I have excerpted relevant sections of the Act including the section you mentioned. So no lump sum payments for psychiatric injury but ongoing payments for those workers with a psychiatric impairment of 30% or more when the psychiatric injury is due to ‘pure mental harm’ or in other jurisdictions is described as ‘primary psychiatric impairment’ or ‘impairment not secondary to physical injury’.

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