The former Telstra senior project manager claimed it was irrelevant what she was doing when she was injured, because the injury occurred by reference to a place – the hotel she was staying at for her employment, which had slippery wet tiles.

But Justice John Snaden said the authorities on this issue never stated an injury must be referable only to an activity or a place, rather than an activity and a place. He found there were “exceptional” circumstances that broke the connection between the Telstra worker’s injury and her employment.

Noting that the worker had been entitled to spend her evening the way she did and his ruling should “not be mistaken for disapproval,” he found the fact that her injury occurred after “extensive socialising” and just hours before she was scheduled to attend work again, to be circumstances that lacked a connection with her employment.

The Brisbane-based worker injured her hip slipping on newly mopped tiles outside a foyer bathroom at her employer-organised hotel at 2.30 in the morning, during a three-night work trip in Melbourne in April 2016.

She and her colleague had dined at a restaurant until nearly midnight, before going to a cocktail bar and then returning to the worker’s hotel, where the worker slipped.

As reported by OHS Alert in 2018, the worker was denied workers’ compensation and the AAT upheld the decision, finding that socialising for more than eight hours until 2.30am was not an activity induced or encouraged by the employer.

AAT Member Anna Burke said “common sense would dictate an employee required to be at work the following day would be expected at this hour of the night to be securely in her hotel room, which had a serviceable bathroom which she could have utilised, placing her at no risk of falling on a recently cleaned floor.”

The worker appealed, telling the Federal Court her actions on the night in question were irrelevant in determining whether she suffered an “injury” within the meaning of the Commonwealth SRC Act.

She argued the injury occurred as a result of the wet slippery tiles that were a hazard at the hotel Telstra encouraged or induced her to be in, meaning it arose out of or in the course of her employment.

Justice Snaden found the Telstra worker’s injury came about to a degree because of her interaction with a hazard “peculiar” to her hotel, but rejected her claim that the inquiry should end there.

“[The worker’s] interaction with that hazard arose because of the time at which it materialised and the time at which she happened upon it,” he said.

“[She] was, of course, perfectly entitled to spend her evening in the way that she did. The present inquiry is as to whether or not the circumstances betray an absence of connection between the injury and the employment. In my view, they do.”

Justice Snaden found Member Burke correctly decided the worker’s injuries were a result of the activities she was engaged in at the time, “did not occur merely by reference to a place,” and lacked a connection with her employment.

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Dring v Telstra Corporation Limited [2020] FCA 699 (26 May 2020)