New South Wales Consolidated Acts

WORKPLACE INJURY MANAGEMENT AND WORKERS COMPENSATION ACT 1998 - SECT 81A

81A Parties to conciliation to provide copies of documents before conciliation conference

(1) At least 7 days before a conciliation conference on the dispute, each party to the dispute must provide to the other party and to the conciliator a copy of any documents on which the party proposes to rely in connection with the conciliation of the dispute.

(2) A party to a dispute who fails without reasonable excuse to comply with a requirement of this section is guilty of an offence.

Maximum penalty: 50 penalty units.

(3) Subsection (2) does not apply if the party is a worker unless it is established that the worker was represented by a legal practitioner or agent (as defined in section 131) at the relevant time.

(4) Any document that a party has that is not provided by the party as required by this section is not admissible on behalf of the party in proceedings on such a dispute before a conciliator or the Compensation Court.

(5) The regulations may provide for exceptions to subsection (4). In particular, the regulations may authorise a conciliator or the Compensation Court to permit the admission in proceedings before the conciliator or Court in specified circumstances of a document that would otherwise be not admissible under that subsection.

(6) If a conciliator is satisfied that a party to a dispute has failed without reasonable excuse to comply with a requirement of this section, the conciliator may:

(a) refer the matter to the Authority, and

(b) note the matter in a conciliation certificate issued by the conciliator in respect of the dispute (together with details of the documents to which the failure relates).

(7) Nothing in this section affects any power of the conciliator under section 80 (Power of conciliator to require information) or 81 (Power of conciliator to provide information and documents to a party).

Note: Examples of the documents to which this section applies are medical reports, investigators’ reports, rehabilitation providers’ reports and reports of assessments under section 40A (Assessment of incapacitated worker’s ability to earn) of the 1987 Act.