COMPENSATION CLAIM

Hokitika Guardian, 9 June 1931, Page 6

COMPENSATION CLAIM

FAILS THROUGH.BREACH OF REGULATIONS.

(By Telegraph—ter tress Association)

- WESTPORT, une S. A worker’s compensation case, Hjinde v. Westport-Stockton Coal Alining Company, was decided in the Court of Arbitration today. It is believed to lie the first of its kind to come ip) for judicial consideration in this country. lire IaoLS were that the plaintiff sustained serious and permanent injury, namely the loss of his left arm, as the result of falling, when he alighted from a rake of trucks provided by the defendant company for the purpose of conveying men to and from work.

It was admitted that the men were within the protection of the Workers’ Compensation Act, while being conveyed by the defendant. The Company denied that trie plaintiff was entitled to succeed for file reason that he had committed a breach of Regulation 107, gazetted pursuant to the. authoity of the Coal Aline Act, 1923, which forbids the men to board, or, to alight from, workers’ trains, or to ride on the buffers thereof, while in motion. After hearing the evidence of the witnesses and the legal argument of Air P. J. O'Regan (for plaintiff) and of Air K. Tracy (for the defendant Company), the Court held that there had boon a breach of the regulations, and therefore dismissed the claim.

The Company did not ask for costs