Walker Law Group Compensation Lawyers

We’re thrilled to announce that our Leong Brown is now recognized as an Independent Review Office Approved Lawyer — a significant milestone that reflects her dedication and growing expertise in the field of personal injury law in general and #workerscompensation in particular. https://lnkd.in/gKWbVTUK

The Walker Law Group Compensation Lawyers' Andres Agudelo Guerra's latest case study on a decision of the Personal Injury Commission involving a psychological injury and section 11A of the Workers Compensation Act NSW 1987 https://lnkd.in/gd7Tfc5M

We’re thrilled to announce that our Lauren Harrison is now recognized as an Independent Review Office Approved Lawyer — a significant milestone that reflects her dedication and growing expertise in the field of personal injury law in general and #workerscompensation in particular. https://lnkd.in/gZZDVib5

The Walker Law Group Compensation Lawyers' Lauren Harrison's latest case study on a decision of the Personal Injury Commission involving a psychological injury and section 11A of the Workers Compensation Act NSW 1987 https://lnkd.in/d6jD-aXX

On Friday at the Australian Lawyers Alliance conference, Barrister Craig Tanner gave a presentation on the proposed changes of the NSW Government for psychological injury claims. https://lnkd.in/gf2QzAJW To our knowledge the actual bill has not yet been finalized but the Treasurer Daniel Mookhey and Premier Chris Minns are on record with enough detail that enabled Craig on Friday and indeed members of our own firm on other occasions, to raise serious concerns about the Government’s legislative agenda. Of serious concern are the proposed changes that could particularly impact on public servants like #nurses, #teachers and #correctives workers, that would prevent them from lodging a workers compensation claim for a mental illness in the workplace without going through an unknown and potentially cruel Industrial Relations Commission process first. This attempt by the Labour Government to eliminate the claims being lodged in the first place was decried by Craig Tanner as motivated by ‘self-interest’ and is in sharp contrast to any rhetoric from the Government that these changes will benefit the community as a whole. The Government has previously committed to consultation about their legislative agenda but as noted by other peers in the industry, the commitment to consultation seems narrow and not involving law firms like ours actually working at the coal face with injured people. We suggest to the Government that consultation needs to be broadly done before any changes are made that would have an adverse impact on the people serving the great state of NSW.

We are shocked, chagrined, mortified and stupefied by the NSW Government kicking injured workers to the curb under their recently declared legislative agenda against workers who have the courage to report a #mentalillness occuring at work https://lnkd.in/gSZxNP2e

Nearly our whole team from the Walker Law Group Newcastle office at the Independent Review Office regional seminar today! Maddie Brown Olivia Mallon Ellie Townsend Leong Brown Lily Burgmann Bridget Ramsay Lauren Harrison Claire Annis-Brown Hannah Blair Malia Rudder Andres Agudelo Guerra Jordan Manning Kim Rudder Grant Taljaard Kevin Sawers

It is saddening to hear Premier Chris Minns attributing some of the blame on the state of the NSW Workers Compensation Scheme to the application of provisional liability (PL). SIRA’s claims management guide commends PL saying it: “…provides a worker with early access to treatment and financial assistance while the insurer undertakes the necessary investigations to determine liability on the claim. This is important to enable the insurer to actively manage the first four weeks of a claim to optimise recovery and work outcomes…” The Premier’s criticism of PL seems to be connected to payments being made on the claim but at the same time “…the workplace does not change at all.” This seems to us to be a strange criticism? To blame PL and workers just because the workplace where the injury arose, not being motivated to change after a claim is lodged? Using this to justify proposed drastic changes such as forcing an unwell person to survive a process in the Industrial Relation Commission (IRC) that is of unknown duration and unknown process, without any of the supports available under PL, before they can even lodge a claim, seems cruel? We agree with the Premier that more can be done during PL to optimize outcomes but deleting it altogether, or even just delaying it until after some unspecified period of time at the IRC, to leave injured workers suffering a mental illness without any kind of support is just not the answer. Link to the SIRA claims management guide content on PL here: https://lnkd.in/g5FKuH2e

We are concerned about the proposed changes to workers compensation laws effecting people who make a claim for a mental illness sustained in the workplace.   Psychological injury claims are already amongst the most contentious of claims that arise in the NSW workers compensation system.   The current claims management approach is adversarial in nature, generally focusing more on the arranging of a factual investigation and an Independent Medical Examination than on injury management or return to work. In our experience this claims management approach hinders, rather than assists, the recovery of the injured person and largely goes against the scheme objectives. Our firm previously made a submission to this effect in the 2022 parliamentary review into the workers compensation scheme. The proposed changes add a further requirement to proceed through the Industrial Relations Commission before being able to lodge a workers compensation claim and access treatment or income support.   In our view these changes have the potential to lead to worse health outcomes for people who are injured at work, delaying treatment and access to income support and further exacerbating the challenges that already exist in securing a return to work. Member Daniel Mookhey has committed to consultation about any proposed changes. We hope the consultation is broad. Link to the 2022 review here: https://lnkd.in/gvGXX9VH Link to our submission here: https://lnkd.in/g6jvd7pG

So proud of our Mae Limbaco and her recent being moved for admission as a lawyer by our principal, Mr Steve Walker! Good on you Mae you legend!