Employer's Liability for Compensation

In one line

If a worker is hurt or killed by an accident or a listed disease that arose out of and in the course of his work, his employer must pay, whether or not anybody was careless, unless one of four narrow exceptions applies.

In exam wording: section 74(1) of the Code on Social Security 2020 makes an employer liable to pay compensation where personal injury is caused to an employee by accident or an occupational disease listed in the Third Schedule arising out of and in the course of his employment, subject to the exceptions in the proviso relating to injuries not disabling for more than three days and to injuries not causing death or permanent total disablement which are directly attributable to drink or drugs, wilful disobedience of a safety order or rule, or wilful removal or disregard of a safety guard.

Why the law has this at all

Because industrial work injures people whether or not anybody is at fault, and somebody has to carry that cost. The choice is between the worker, who cannot, and the employer, who can insure and can price it into the work. The law puts it on the employer.

The condition is not fault; it is connection with the work. That is the whole function of the phrase "arising out of and in the course of his employment". The employer pays for the risks of his enterprise, not for everything that happens to his workers.

Read the section as one rule and four exceptions, because that is how it is set and how it is examined. The rule is very wide. The exceptions are drawn narrowly, and three of the four fall away entirely where the injury is serious.

Some words this chapter uses

Accident in this context means an unlooked-for mishap or untoward event which is not expected or designed, judged from the point of view of the person injured. Occupational disease is one peculiar to a particular employment, listed in the Third Schedule. Wilful means deliberate and intentional, not merely careless. Directly attributable to means caused by, not merely accompanied by. Notional extension is the doctrine that the employer's premises extend a reasonable distance in time and place beyond the actual workplace. Nexus means a connection or link.

Section 74(1): the rule

If personal injury is caused to an employee by accident or an occupational disease listed in the Third Schedule, arising out of and in the course of his employment, his employer shall be liable to pay compensation in accordance with the Chapter.

Four elements, and each must be present.

1. Personal injury. Injury to the person, which includes disease where the Chapter says so, and includes psychological injury where it can be proved as an injury.