Workers' Compensation and Rehabilitation and Other Acts Amendment Bill 2006
The Workers' Compensation and Rehabilitation Amendment Bill 2006 (PDF, 406 KB) was introduced into Parliament on 28 February 2006.
Background to the Amendment Bill
Objectives of the Amendment Bill
Links to the Legislation
Background to the Amendment Bill
The amendment Bill was introduced in response to the Queensland Court of Appeal's decision in Australia Meat Holdings Pty Limited -v- Douglas & Ors.
The court's decision opens the way for employers and insurers and their legal representatives to appear at medical assessment tribunal hearings. The tribunal hearings are of a clinical nature, usually involving an examination and, historically, only attended by the claimant and their representative.
Without legislative change this decision will potentially make the tribunal process adversarial, more legalistic, and less efficient and lead to increased costs for workers, insurers, employers and the scheme in general.
In addition, the decision may only apply to workers injured prior to 1 July 2003. This opens the way for injured workers to face differing treatments, depending on when they received their injuries, rather than a consistent process for everyone.
Objectives of the Amendment Bill
The objective of the Bill is to keep Queensland's Medical Assessment Tribunals both independent and non-adversarial by addressing the implications arising from a Queensland Court of Appeal decision.
The proposed Bill aims to achieve this by:
- clarifying that an insurer, employer or any other person (other than the worker or their representative) has no entitlement to be present or heard before a tribunal
- safeguarding all parties' rights to full disclosure and the opportunity to comment on written material submitted to a medical assessment tribunal before the material can be considered by a tribunal at a hearing
- ensuring the confidentiality of information disclosed to a tribunal during a personal examination through the transcript and record keeping requirements of tribunals
- ensuring the amendments made in this Act also apply to references made under former Acts.
Links to the legislation:
- Workers' Compensation and Rehabilitation Amendment Bill 2006 (PDF, 406 KB)
- Explanatory notes for the Workers' Compensation and Rehabilitation Amendment Bill 2006 (PDF, 53KB)
Last updated March 17, 2006
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