This is no secret to doctors, lawyers, trade union and employer advocates
who specialise in workers' compensation matters.
Nor is it a surprise for many workers caught up in the WorkCover system
after a serious injury.
What is not so well-known is that the pressure some claimants experience
as a result of being on compensation creates such a grinding sense of despair
and hopelessness that they start thinking about suicide as a solution to their
problems. Most don't follow through, but a few do.
Although WorkCover is not necessarily to blame, there have been at least
14 reported WorkCover-related suicides in South Australia in recent years.
There have probably been more. But in any event, 14 is far too many.
A large part of the problem is that workers' compensation schemes are
inherently adversarial, often resulting in claims disputes that have anti-therapeutic
effects on the people they are supposed to help.
Disputes over the amount of weekly payments workers are entitled to,
ongoing eligibility for compensation, return to work plans and other claims
management issues all provide fertile ground for the creation of adversarial
relations between injured workers, insurers and employers.
Most people injured at work are back on the job within a month, usually
without any adverse effect as a result of being on the WorkCover system.
But for those with more serious injuries, it can be a very different story.
Being unable to return to work for an extended period can have a
devastating effect on a worker's self-esteem. Not being able to work
following an injury also frequently means being unable to enjoy the
amenities of life the rest of us take for granted - like going for a walk,
playing with the children or being able to get through the day without
pain-killing drugs.
The last thing injured workers need is a workers' comp system that
makes life even harder. Yet this is what repeatedly happens.
No job, claims managers that don't believe you're really injured, and
a dysfunctional, one-size-fits-all rehabilitation system all too often mean
injured workers are stripped of their humanity and reduced to nothing
more than a "claim".
The Rann Government's draconian 2008 WorkCover changes,
backed by the Liberal Opposition, have made the situation a whole
lot worse.
Big cuts in compensation payments for the seriously injured and new
legal obstacles that undercut their ability to challenge poor claims decisions
means the system is now more adversarial and demeaning than at any
time in WorkCover's history.
So, what can be done to prevent WorkCover-related suicides?
As a first step we need to start talking about it. Unless the veil of invisibility
surrounding this issue is lifted, more people will die and more families
will bear a burden of heartbreaking grief.
Practical assistance and advice to help families and other stakeholders in
identifying injured workers most at risk of taking their own lives is
another important step.
It is also essential, of course, to deal with the root causes of the problem.
This means reducing the toxic adversarial climate that has been allowed
to build up within the WorkCover environment.
To accomplish this, action is needed on at least three major fronts.
The first involves rolling back the worst aspects of Mr Rann's 2008
legislative changes to the scheme.
The second requires an overhaul of existing rehabilitation arrangements,
including retraining, to assist injured workers return to meaningful employment.
The third, and in many ways most important, is the need to create a
workers' compensation culture that supports, rather than stigmatises,
people who have had the misfortune of being seriously injured as a result
of their employment.
If the Government is serious about preventing more WorkCover-related
suicides this needs to happen sooner, not later.
* BeyondBlue info line 1300 22 4636 or www.beyondblue.org.au
Kevin Purse is a Senior Research Fellow at the University of South
Australia and a former WorkCover director.
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