Section 151M — Workers Compensation Act 1987 (NSW)

(1) A plaintiff has only such right to interest on damages as is conferred by this section.
(2), (3)
(4) (a) Interest is not payable (and a court cannot order the payment of interest) on damages unless—
(i) information that would enable a proper assessment of the plaintiff’s claim has been given to the defendant and the defendant has had a reasonable opportunity to make an offer of settlement (where it would be appropriate to do so) in respect of the plaintiff’s full entitlement to all damages of any kind but has not made such an offer, or
(ii) the defendant has had a reasonable opportunity to make a revised offer of settlement (where it would be appropriate to do so) in the light of further information given by the plaintiff that would enable a proper assessment of the plaintiff’s full entitlement to all damages of any kind but has not made such an offer, or
(iii) the defendant has made an offer of settlement, the amount of all damages of any kind awarded by the court (without the addition of any interest) is more than 20% higher than the highest amount offered by the defendant and the highest amount is unreasonable having regard to the information available to the defendant when the offer was made.
(b) The highest amount offered by the defendant is not unreasonable if, when the offer was made, the defendant was not able to make a reasonable assessment of the plaintiff’s full entitlement to all damages of any kind.
(c) For the purposes of this subsection, an offer of settlement must be in writing.
(5) If a court is satisfied that interest is payable under subsection (4) on damages—
(a) the amount of interest is to be calculated for the period from the date of the death of or injury to the worker until the date on which the court determines the damages, and
(b) the amount of interest is to be calculated in accordance with the principles ordinarily applied by the court for that purpose, subject to this section.
(6) The rate of interest to be used in any such calculation is three-quarters of the rate prescribed for the purposes of section 101 of the Civil Procedure Act 2005 for the period concerned.
(7) Nothing in this section affects the payment of interest on a debt under a judgment or order of a court.

Related sections

• s 151IA — Retirement age
• s 151J — Damages for future economic loss—discount rate
• s 151L — Mitigation of damages
• s 151N — Contributory negligence—generally
• s 151O — Defence of voluntary assumption of risk
• s 151Q — Structured settlements

Research how courts apply s 151M

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