Workplace Death Compensation

The Hon. C. BONAROS (14:51): Supplementary: does the Attorney accept that the current definitions of dependents that apply in the Return to Work scheme do not necessarily fit modern day families when it comes to that reliance that he speaks on, and that legal dependence may have a very different meaning to the modern day family structure and dependence that may result?

The Hon. K.J. MAHER (Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, Attorney-General, Minister for Industrial Relations and Public Sector) (14:51): I thank the honourable member for her question. Again, I will need to check but, if I am recalling correctly, the scheme contemplates those, such as a spouse and others, who are dependent on a person like an underage child, but I think the scheme contemplates other people who are dependent upon the person's income.

So I think the scheme already contemplates that there may be other forms of people who are dependent who don't meet what might have been a definition of very strictly a spouse or a child, that might have been a definition that was more widely used in decades gone by. But if that's not the case, I will bring back a reply.