Employer must provide suitable work for contract workers
106 Employer must provide suitable work for contract workers
This section applies if—
a contract worker has been totally or partially incapacitated for work because of an injury; and
the worker can return to work, whether on a full-time or part-time basis, and whether or not to the worker’s previous employment; and
within the defined period, the worker asks the employer liable to pay the compensation to provide employment for the worker.
The employer must provide employment to the worker that is—
so far as reasonably practical, the same as, or equivalent to, the employment in which the worker was employed at the time of the injury; and
otherwise suitable employment for the worker.
Maximum penalty: 10 penalty units.
An offence against this section is a strict liability offence.
This section does not apply if—
the worker voluntarily left the employment of the employer after the injury happened (whether before or after the beginning of the incapacity for work); or
the employer ended the worker’s employment after the injury happened for a reason other than because the worker was not fit for employment because of the injury; or
the employer is a non-business employer; or
the employer cannot provide suitable employment.
In this section:
contract period includes the period of any reasonably expected extension or renewal of the contract.
defined period, for a contract worker who is entitled to weekly compensation, means the period beginning on the day the worker becomes entitled to weekly compensation and ending—
if the contract period ends, or would end, before the end of 6 months after the day the worker becomes entitled to weekly compensation—at the end of the contract period; or
in any other case—6 months after the day the worker becomes entitled to weekly compensation.
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