Abuse at work, psychological injury and worker’s compensation

The recent case of Skinner v Workers Compensation Regulator [2022] QIRC 019 is notable as a decision where a claim for psychological injury was accepted on appeal to the Industrial Relations Commission. It is particularly timely in that the decision deals with a worker who sustained psychological injury after exposure to frequent abuse from the public in the course of her work.

It is often difficult to have claims for psychological injury that occur due to the injured person’s employment accepted by WorkCover due to a specific exclusion in the legislation. This section operates to exclude claims for psychological injury that arise from ‘reasonable management action taken in a reasonable way’. In practice, this phrase is so broad that it makes it difficult for many claims for psychiatric injury to be accepted by WorkCover. What is significant about this claim is that despite that argument being used to reject the worker’s claim, the Commissioner found that it was the impact of the abuse that she was exposed to as a result of her work that was the cause of her injury, and that management’s actions had nothing to do with the worker’s injury. In fact, the evidence of her employer was that the worker was ‘a valued contributor to her team and delivered work to a high standard.’ The Commissioner found that being exposed to the abusive phone calls was part of her role at Council and that therefore her injury had occurred in the course of her employment.

Unfortunately, frontline staff in retail, hospitality and of course health workers have been exposed to increased incidents of abuse as we have all struggled to deal with the stress and strain of COVID. We have all seen footage of staff at supermarkets, pharmacies and hardware stores bearing the brunt of community stress as a result of goods shortages and reduced hours combined with high demand.

Having to deal with this kind of behaviour from the public should never be a part of someone’s job. This decision may offer comfort to stressed out frontline workers as it may be easier for workers who do endure this abuse to access the benefit of the workers compensation scheme in the event that they are injured as a result of it.