As CEOs push for workers to return to the office a recent compensation case finding has added yet another angle to the work-from-home debate.
The case in question involves a tribunal decision in favour of compensating a council officer after she tripped over a 60cm-high pet fence after getting up to make coffee while working at home.
The woman sustained a broken arm and injured knee in the accident. She had erected the fence to separate a puppy she was minding for a colleague from her pet rabbit.
But wait… what?
The decision raised eyebrows, triggered online debate and a “wave of incredulity” from readers as one outlet stated. But the facts of the matter were that the South Australian Employment Tribunal (SAET) ultimately decided in favour of the council worker being compensated because her injuries arose out of employment and that the fence was a significant contributing cause.
The SAET’s decision also overturned an initial rejection of the employee’s claim against the Local Government Association Workers Compensation Scheme. In that instance, it had been argued the employee’s claim was invalid because the pet fence was a clear and unusual hazard and that the employer could not have anticipated the employee would place one along her route to the kitchen. The insurer also put forward that had the fence not been there, the fall would not have occurred. The SAET however stressed that the although the employee had created her own workplace hazard it did not preclude a finding that it was an employment-related cause.
Applying the “could it happen here?” test: Now, for those NSW employers thinking “well that’s only in South Australia”, legal experts disagree. Lawyers from legal firm Bartier Perry for instance point out that as the law currently stands in NSW, the same decision would very likely be made here. Under the Workers Compensation Act 1987, the following tests, they say, apply to establish a compensable injury:
- the injury must “arise out of or in the course of” the worker’s employment and 2. employment must be a substantial contributing factor to the injury.
Furthermore, the lawyer representing the employee reminded those who expressed surprise at the judgement that it is a “no fault system” for worker’s compensation claims. All that needed to be proved was that the injury was sustained “while at work”.
Fuelling debate
The issue is sure to add fuel to employer arguments in favour of a return to the office. As lawyers use the case as basis to advise employers on mitigating WFH incidents via such avenues as safety checklists and encouraging workers to report possible home hazards, the number of organisations calling for five days a week in the office continues to rise.
Since September, several heavy hitters on the Australian corporate scene including Amazon and Tabcorp have told staff they will be required back in the office five days a week from January 2025. Flight Centre and Dell have issued similar edicts, while in August the NSW Premier’s department declared that staff need to be in the office at least three days a week or more. Research is supporting the push with just over 80 per cent of CEO’s telling a KPMG survey they want their workers back in eyesight.
Still, the success of the push, and its effect on the commercial property’s office sector, remain to be seen. Of those companies that have implemented return-to-the-office mandates so far, many have had to do so several times due to employee resistance and resignations from those wanting to hang on their free and flexible hybrid-working lifestyles.
This particular group of workers however will find heartening that even Richard Wynn, the CEO of the CEO Institute, favours a hybrid workplace. He was recently quoted as saying that CEOs and leaders needed to experiment with their back-to-office mandates, “to understand what their culture is within their organisations” and help them define whether they needed to mandate or not.
But boosting office occupancy rates remains a challenge. Latest figures for the September quarter put Sydney’s office vacancy rate at around 14.7 per cent and Melbourne’s closer to 20 per cent. Unlike NSW, the Victorian government has not yet implemented a strict return-to-the-office policy either, which analysts say would help encourage corporates to do the same. There are winners in the office sector though: the landlords who own A-grade properties and any workers who find themselves employed within their luxurious surrounds. These most chic workplaces continue to prove exceedingly popular with tenants, prime grade office towers accounting for more than 80 per cent of space leased over the third quarter.