SIRA NSW and the Illusion of Regulation: When Oversight Fails - October 2021

The Regulator That Didn’t Regulate

On 7 October 2021, just days after yet another escalation attempt to SafeWork NSW, I turned to the body that was supposed to sit above it all.

The authority responsible for overseeing the workers compensation system in New South Wales.

SIRA NSW.

But this didn’t start there.

It started with me trying to survive.

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Another Attempt to Be Heard

On 4 October 2021, I sent what I can only describe as another attempt to be heard.

Not my first email.

Not my second.

By that point, I had lost count.

It was the culmination of months — years — of trying to engage a system that claimed to exist for worker protection.

A system I trusted.

A system I believed in.

This email was addressed to SafeWork NSW.

I had provided evidence of:

• ongoing workplace harm

• failures in injury management

• the complete failure of a safe return to work

• and conduct that should never occur in a system meant to protect people

And I asked a question that, looking back, feels almost naive:

Who is responsible for ensuring the system actually works?

Because at that point, it clearly wasn’t working.

Not for me.

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The Law That Was Supposed to Protect Me

What makes this harder to reconcile is that the obligations are not unclear.

They are written into law.

Under the Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (NSW):

• Section 19 imposes a primary duty of care on employers to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health and safety of workers — including psychological health.

• Section 27 imposes a due diligence obligation on officers to ensure the organisation complies with those duties.

In parallel, the SIRA Standards of Practice require insurers to:

• act with fairness, transparency and integrity

• support recovery through effective injury management and return to work planning

• communicate respectfully with workers and their nominated treating practitioners

• and ensure decisions are evidence-based and timely

These are enforceable frameworks designed to protect workers — especially those who are vulnerable.

And yet, in practice, those protections were absent.

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The Human Cost Behind the Process

What sits behind all of this — all the documents, the emails, the evidence — is a human being.

Me.

I was trying to hold my life together while the system that was supposed to protect me continued to fail.

I wasn’t just dealing with process issues.

I was dealing with:

• harassment

• fear

• loss of safety

• breaches of my privacy

• and a growing sense that I was completely alone inside a system that had closed ranks

And perhaps most confronting of all:

“I was the one threatened… as was my family.”

That is not something I say lightly. That is something I lived.

This is where it stopped being administrative failure.

This is where it became something else.

Something darker.

Because when systems fail repeatedly, they don’t just fail.

They harm.

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When Regulators Don’t Regulate

One of the most difficult realisations in this process was this:

The bodies responsible for enforcement were not enforcing.

I gave them everything:

• evidence

• timelines

• documentation

• opportunities to act

There was no visible, transparent investigation. No clear pathway to resolution.

And no communication that reflected the seriousness of what had been raised.

No care.

So I asked them:

What will SafeWork NSW and SIRA do to regain public trust?

Because trust, once broken like this, is not easily repaired.

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A Second Chance for Accountability

When I wrote to SIRA NSW on 7 October 2021, I made something very clear.

This was not the beginning. This was a second chance.

It was another chance for SIRA to:

• review the evidence already submitted

• investigate insurer and employer conduct

• examine its own internal handling of my complaint

• and demonstrate that regulatory oversight was more than a concept on paper

Instead, what I experienced was something far more troubling.

I experienced a pattern that felt like avoidance.

Or worse — indifference.

“I expect a legitimate timeline regarding investigating my complaint…”

Because without a timeline, there is no accountability. 

Only delay. Damage. Harm.

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The Regulator and the Reality

SIRA says it regulates.

That it monitors insurers.

That it ensures compliance.

That it supports injured workers.

That it delivers outcomes.

That is what is written.

That is what is published.

That is what the public is told.

But that is not what I experienced.

While all of that was being said publicly, I was living the opposite privately.

Despite repeated evidence of:

• ignored medical recommendations

• breakdowns in injury management

• misleading information provided to treating practitioners

• and systemic failures

There was no visible regulatory intervention.

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When Evidence Meets Inaction

One example I raised was deeply concerning. It still doesn’t sit well with me.

My doctor — the person responsible for helping me recover — was given conflicting information by the insurer.

He was told someone had “left”.

But the evidence at the time suggested otherwise.

The individual’s public profile still showed them as a Senior Claim / Injury Management Specialist at CCI.

So I did what I had been forced to do throughout this entire process.

I checked.

I verified.

I questioned.

And I responded to the still Senior Claim / Injury Management Specialist at CCI:

“CCI informed my GP you’d left… more incriminating data.”

And then something happened that I cannot ignore.

Shortly after this was raised — the LinkedIn profile changed.

Suddenly, this individual was now a Senior Claims Advisor at Transport for NSW.

Just like that.

Questions that require answers and accountability

And the timing?

It aligned with when my GP had been given the runaround.

The same kind of runaround my family had experienced.

The same pattern.

That word — pattern — matters, because this wasn’t just one moment.

It was happening across different people.

Different interactions.

Different parts of the system.

So I was left asking questions that no injured worker should have to ask:

• When did this person actually leave?

• Why was my doctor given conflicting information?

• Why did clarity only appear after I challenged it?

I beg to differ with the title of “injury management specialist”.

Because what I experienced was not injury management.

It was the opposite. Therefore this "injury management specialist" at CCI was unfit to do the inherent requirements of her job!

And the impact of that?

Severe.

This wasn’t about LinkedIn.

This was about truth.

When information given to treating doctors is unreliable, it doesn’t just affect paperwork.

It affects care.

It affects recovery.

It affects lives.

And this — this right here — is exactly what a regulator is supposed to step into.

But no one did.

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Where Experience Meets Obligation

When I reflect on what occurred, it is difficult to reconcile these experiences with the regulatory framework SIRA is entrusted to uphold.

The absence of visible regulatory intervention, despite repeated reports of risk and non-compliance, raises serious questions about whether:

• insurer conduct was assessed against the SIRA Standards of Practice, including fairness, transparency, and timely decision-making

• obligations relating to effective injury management and return to work were properly monitored

• and whether appropriate regulatory action was considered where performance appeared inconsistent with those standards

In other words:

If the Standards of Practice were applied properly —

this should not have happened.

If fairness was applied —

this should not have happened.

If transparency existed —

this should not have happened.

If return to work obligations were taken seriously —

this should not have happened.

And yet, it did.

So I am left with questions that deserve answers.

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The Question of Integrity

At one point, I wrote:

“What is the truth regarding you, the regulator of the workers compensation scheme?”

That question came after:

• months of escalation

• repeated attempts to engage

• and a growing gap between what was said publicly and what was experienced privately

Because regulation is not defined by policy documents.

It is defined by action.

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The Human Impact of Regulatory Failure

When a regulator does not act, the consequences are REAL.

They affect:

• a worker’s recovery

• their financial stability

• their sense of safety

• and often, their family

In my case, the impact extended beyond process failure.

It became a question of survival.

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When Systems Protect Themselves

This is one of the hardest things to say.

It felt like the system was protecting itself.

Not me, the worker, the person it was designed to protect.

I began to question:

• whether complaints were being genuinely assessed

• whether information was being shared transparently

• and whether accountability mechanisms were functioning at all

Because when a regulator fails to act, it creates space for misconduct to continue.

Unchallenged.

Put another way, when a regulator fails to act, it enables harm.

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The Breaking Point

By mid-October 2021, the pattern was clear.

No timeline.

No meaningful response.

No investigation that I could see.

So I said what many people are forced to say when systems fail:

The truth will need to be told elsewhere.

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Why This Matters

This case raises fundamental questions about the system itself:

• What does regulation mean if it is not enforced?

• How are insurers held accountable in practice?

• What safeguards exist when both employer and insurer fail?

• And critically — who regulates the regulator?

It also raises broader questions:

• What happens when regulators fail to act?

• What protections exist for psychologically injured workers?

• How is accountability enforced when systems close ranks?

• And how many others experience the same silence?

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Closing Reflection

There is a phrase often used in policy documents:

“A mentally healthy workplace.”

I believed in that.

I lived my work with integrity.

I trusted that system.

But words don’t protect people.

Action does.

There is also a word often used in regulatory language:

“Oversight.”

But oversight is not a document.

It is not a framework.

It is not a statement on a website.

Oversight is action.

When action is absent, oversight becomes illusion.

Source: contemporaneous record of events - Documents 201-202.