EARTHQUAKE CASES

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18206, 29 September 1933, Page 10

EARTHQUAKE CASES

LEGAL POSITION REVIEWED PRIVY ' <)PN< 'IP'S 1 >!■-< P I' IX Tim W;ii position in regard to t ho Hawkes day earl)n 111 ;iU«" cases. the subject of a decision by tlu? Privy Council Iv. is reviewed l.i, v Mr. t - A. P. Treadwell in tin 1 current issue of the New Zealand Law .Journal. Mr. ireadwell states that it eaine as asurprise to uiauv to le.irn that the Piny Council had reversed the position of the New Zealand < unit of Appeal in the appeals hv injure.! workers or their dependants whoso claims the Court of Appeal had decided were based on accidents that did not come within the. meaning of the Workers’ Compensation Act as “arising out of the employment o! the workers. |.<’or the purposes of Ids notice, .Mr. I readwell cites the tacts of one of the four appeals, namely, in the ease ol Pa'ooker v. Thomas liortliwiek and Hons, Limited. Drooker, a I reeling works employee, was employed at tile time ol the. earth,jiiako on a staging, about' 4lt. above a table and a little more than -i'll, from the ground. The access to the staging was. from the table. When the earthquake, occurred, llrooker. while stepping -oil to the table, was pinned down by falling debris and killed. 11 is widow was the plainfill. Did tlm accident arise out of the employment or was it, due to a risk unconnected ,‘witlt. the employment ; in other words, was it, a community risk, one that was held by all In tlie. area of the earthquake irrespective ol employment? T lie Privy Council held that Jjrouker s death arose out of his employment. When one considered that an earthquake caused," whether proNimately or more remotely, the death involved in the claim, states Mr. Treadwell, to say that the death arose out of IJrooker s service to his employers .seemed to he straining the ordinary meaning of the words. That indeed was the view the New Zealand Court of Appeal had taken.

'Phi principle, which determined the cases was that the Court could nut go behind to inquire into the 'cause of a building falling on to a workman. Thai fail siillie-'d to establish liability. Mr. Treadwell .says that as lie understands Ihe ruling ol I lie Privy ('ouneil, it i that liability arises whenever the work man is injured because bis work caused him lo be, mi the particular site at the time be was injured. If a workman were injured by an object falling on him. .such as a brick from the wall ol a room wherein lie worked, lie was within the Act no matter how flm brick

eaine to tall on him, provided it, was bis employer s briik. Tlie casual row iieclion was one arising 111 rough the cm ploy men t and not. through the, original cause w hich operated so as'to drop tin brick, oil the workman. It, was diilicidl to know whether the Privy Council would luiye |jdd, in a street rase, if I Ininjured workman bail been thrown on his head in the. street, that tin; earth quake or the hard road was direct I v re sponsible for the injured head. The Privy Coum d realised that the, principle evolved by if could be extremely narrow at times.

Mr. Treadwell concludes ids article with this comment on'the Privy Conn eil’s decision: "l! all sounds clear enough, I suppose. Tint I should haw liked to have seen our Court'<tl Appeal upheld. 'Arising out of’ seems. I say it in all humility, to have jumped nut of the paddock, where it has so long been confined.’'