Workers’ compensation is a fundamental workers’ entitlement, and is central to every Australians’ safety net, having operated in some form for over 100 years, and in New South Wales since 1910. While all responsible policy makers, businesses, and trade unions are on a unity ticket when it comes to ensuring Australian workplaces are safe, the unfortunate reality is that hundreds of thousands of Australian workers are hurt on the job each year, necessitating workers’ compensation schemes to ensure that those who suffer workplace injuries are not driven towards poverty.

Each state has its own workers’ compensation scheme. This report assesses the quality of NSW’s scheme, and whether it is adhering to the core principles codified in substantial 2012 reforms that govern workers’ compensation in the state. A decade on from those reforms, this report casts judgement on the efficacy of the system, analysing data including novel survey data gathered from injured workers for the purpose of this study.

Part 1 of this report outlines the reform process that occurred in 2012 which changed the New South Wales’ workers’ compensation system. Citing a financial liabilities, the then-O’Farrell Coalition Government legislated to adjust the system, while also undertaking a major legislated review of the system just two years later. This report notes that this 2014 review was premature, and was unable to identify the medium term consequences of the 2012 reforms.

In Part 2, the report outlines the seven key principles that were intended to guide the state’s workers’ compensation system in the 2012 reforms, assessing the extent to which these principles have been met. In some instances, principles are being adhered to more closely than others. NSW’s workers’ compensation premiums are close to the national average, for example, which is one principle of the scheme. But on other measures – especially those that deal with how successful the scheme is in enabling workers’ to return to work after injury – the scheme is performing poorly.

Part 3 presents the findings from a survey conducted by the NSW Injured Workers’ Support Network for the purposes of this study. The survey received responses from 106 injured workers in NSW who have interacted with the state’s workers’ compensation scheme. The results paint a dire picture of individual experiences when dealing with workers’ compensation, and the inadequate financial and well-being support the system grants its recipients. In many cases, respondents reported acute mental stress, with a majority of respondents admitting to experiencing suicidal ideation as a result of their experiences with the NSW workers’ compensation scheme.

This report demonstrates that the NSW workers’ compensation system has failed to achieve the objectives set out in the 2012 reform process. In order for NSW to be the best state to work, it needs to ensure its safety nets are robust. This report, and the harrowing stories of those injured workers’ who have bravely and anonymously shared their experiences for this study, demonstrate that many changes affecting injured workers over the last ten years have failed workers and the scheme that supports them. In particular, the voices of those with lived experience of the scheme must be heard and should guide future reforms of the NSW workers’ compensation system.