Commonwealth Numbered Acts

SEAFARERS REHABILITATION AND COMPENSATION ACT 1992 No. 234, 1992 - SECT 28

28.(1) If an employee:

   (a)  suffers an injury; and

   (b)  obtains medical treatment for the injury, being treatment that it was
        reasonable for the employee to obtain in the circumstances;
        compensation is payable for the cost of the medical treatment, of such
        amount as is appropriate, having regard to the nature of the
        treatment.

(2) Subsection (1) applies whether or not the injury results in death,
incapacity for work, or impairment.

(3) For the purposes of subsection (1), the cost of medical treatment
involving the supply, replacement or repair of property used by an employee,
is taken to include any fees or charges paid or payable by the employee to a
legally qualified medical practitioner or dentist, or other qualified person,
for a consultation, examination, prescription or other service reasonably
required in connection with that supply, replacement or repair.

(4) An amount of compensation under subsection (1) is payable:

   (a)  to, or in accordance with the directions of, the employee; or

   (b)  if the employee dies before the compensation is paid and without
        having paid the cost referred to in subsection (1) and another person
        (who is not the legal personal representative of the employee) has
        paid that cost-to that other person; or

   (c)  if that cost has not been paid and the employee, or the legal personal
        representative of the employee, does not claim the compensation-to the
        person to whom the cost is payable.

(5) If an employer is liable to pay any cost referred to in subsection (1),
any amount paid under subsection (4) to the person to whom that cost is
payable is, to the extent of the payment, a discharge of the liability of the
employer.

(6) Subject to subsection (7), if compensation for the cost of medical
treatment is payable, compensation is payable to the employee of an amount
equal to the amount of the expenditure reasonably incurred by the employee:

   (a)  in making a necessary journey for the purpose of obtaining the
        treatment; or

   (b)  in remaining, for the purpose of obtaining the treatment, at a place
        to which the employee has made a journey for that purpose.

(7) Compensation is not payable under subsection (6) unless:

   (a)  the journey covered a substantial distance; or

   (b)  if the journey involved the use of public transport or ambulance
        service-the employee's injury reasonably required the use of such
        transport or service, regardless of the distance involved.

(8) The matters to be taken into account in deciding questions arising under
subsections (6) and (7) include:

   (a)  the place or places where appropriate medical treatment was available
        to the employee; and

   (b)  the means of transport available to the employee for the journey; and

   (c)  the route or routes by which the employee could have travelled; and

   (d)  the accommodation available to the employee.

(9) If:

   (a)  an employee suffers an injury; and

   (b)  a person has reasonably incurred expenditure in connection with the
        transportation of the employee, or, if the employee has died, of the
        employee's body, from the place where the injury was sustained to a
        hospital or similar place, or to a mortuary; and

   (c)  an employee, or the legal personal representative of the employee,
        does not make a claim for compensation for that expenditure;
        compensation of an amount equal to that expenditure is payable to the
        person who incurred the expenditure.