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17.5 Travelling to and from a Temporary Residence

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The form of this provision under the SRCA is:

6(1) Without limiting the circumstances in which an injury to an employee may be treated as having arisen out of, or in the course of, his or her employment, an injury shall, for the purposes of this Act, be treated as having so arisen if it was sustained:

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b) while the employee:

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(iii)was travelling between the place where he or she normally resides and another place, being a place where he or she resides temporarily, as a matter of necessity or convenience, for the purposes of his or her employment.

This provision is designed to cover employees travelling out of hours to temporary work-related accommodation. It would cover, for example, an employee who travelled to another city the night before he or she is due to start work in that city. The travel would be covered even if the employee took an earlier flight than necessary, provided that the journey was between the normal place of residence and the city.

'As a matter of necessity or convenience' dictates why and when travel and temporary accommodation are required. A member may have to travel to and remain in temporary accommodation because his or her work at that place will extend over a number of days and it is not possible to travel home each night ('a matter of necessity'). Alternatively, he or she may be required to travel and remain in temporary accommodation because it would be too tiring to travel directly to and from the normal residence each day ('a matter of convenience').

In any case, in the military situation an ADF member is likely to be under orders and is not likely to have discretion re 'convenience'.

There are no boundary restrictions to temporary accommodation within this provision as, once at the place of temporary residence, it becomes in effect a place of work. Compensation coverage continues under S6(1) (b)(i). Read 16.10 (relating to 'intervals in an overall period of employment') for more detail on compensation coverage while in that temporary accommodation.