WorkCover payouts to Qld education staff hit $500m

Queensland teachers are being stabbed with pencils and having desks thrown at them by students, as compensation payouts top half a billion dollars over the past decade.

Toby Crockford

@tobycrockford23

3 min read

April 25, 2024 - 12:00AM

Rise in Queensland teachers taking leave over violence in classroom (2023)

Education

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Queensland teachers are being stabbed with pencils and having desks thrown at them by students, as compensation payouts top half a billion dollars over the past decade.

New data reveals WorkCover claims paid to Queensland teachers and other school staff for physical and psychological injuries reached a high of $81.5m in the 2022-23 financial year.

And claims for the current financial year already totalled $72m with just over three months to go.

Teachers Professional Association Queensland president Scott Stanford said he was aware of two further WorkCover cases within the past six weeks.

“There was a student in Sarina (near Mackay) making threats and they kicked a female teacher in the leg,” he said.

“That teacher is now off on stress leave, which will be a WorkCover claim.

“There was another case in Logan where a student threw a desk at a female teacher which hit her in the leg, so she’s also off stress leave and has made a WorkCover claim.

“These are the biggest things for WorkCover – I’d say 70 per cent of it is stress leave.

“It is more physiological injury than physical injury.”

The Courier-Mail previously reported details of the shocking incidents that led to school staff lodging WorkCover claims in the year to February 2021.

The more than 2000 incidents included staff being threatened with a replica gun, receiving online death threats, stabbed in the eye with a pencil, sexually assaulted by a student, as well as witnessing or being the subject of bullying or false allegations.

A spokesman for Education Minister Di Farmer said less than 1 per cent of the state’s teachers had received an accepted WorkCover claim due to occupational violence.

“Increases to worker’s compensation claims costs are affected by an increase in workforce

numbers and the cost of medical services. Slips, trips, and falls remain the department’s

highest mechanism of injury,” the spokesman said.

“The department’s active approach to work, health and safety over recent years has led to

greater awareness and encouragement for employees to formally report incidents of

physical verbal or online violence and aggression, regardless of the severity of the injury.

“This has led to an increase in reporting which I believe is a positive outcome.”

Education Minister Di Farmer

Opposition education spokesman Christian Rowan, whose parliamentary Question on Notice revealed the latest WorkCover figures, said the numbers were alarming.

“Queensland taxpayers are continuing to pay the bill for Labor’s failure to ensure teachers and staff are safe in our schools,” he said.

“When will the State Labor Government listen to our frontline teachers and staff, as well as industrial and professional organisations, who have raised significant physical and psychological safety concerns, including from increasing rates of online abuse.

“The LNP will ensure that a zero-tolerance approach to occupational violence in our schools is implemented as a priority, fix Labor’s broken behavioural management system, and deliver a comprehensive teacher workforce strategy that addresses teacher recruitment and retention.”

Mr Stanford said the new WorkCover data showed the system was at breaking point.

“We also need to start looking at teacher training – teachers should be doing one year in a university and then a two-year paid internship in a school,” he said.

“It would better prepare them for teaching as they learn from experienced teachers at the coalface and also this would drastically increase our teacher numbers.”

The spokesman for Ms Farmer said the Department of Education was working on a new workplace violence plan.

“The department is developing an occupational violence and aggression action plan, as

part of our new health, safety and wellbeing strategy,” the spokesman said.

“The action plan will strengthen supports for affected staff and has preventive measures such as a communication and engagement campaign.”

Queensland Teachers’ Union vice-president Leah Olsson said any violence in schools was concerning, and the union took a zero-tolerance approach.

“The Department of Education has a primary duty of care for all their employees and must prioritise the physical and psychosocial safety of staff and students,” she said.

“Education funding is at a critical point right now and a new school resourcing model that supports the increasing complexities of school contexts is essential.”