Section 4 of the Civil Liability Act 2003 (Qld) (‘CLA’) applies it to ‘any civil claim for damages for harm.’ Section 5 excludes it from deciding liability or awards of damages for personal injury if the injury is a Queensland state system workers’ compensation injury other than a travel or recess break claim injury. For a CLA regulated personal injury claim general damages must be assessed under ss 51, 61 and 62 which prescribe an injury scale value (‘ISV’) system for calculating general damages. The Schedule 2 dictionary defines personal injury to include ‘psychological or psychiatric injury.’
Section 5 of Schedule 2 of the Civil Liability Regulation 2005 (Qld) provides that an adverse psychological reaction to a physical injury is merely a feature of the physical injury. The schedule 6 dictionary defines adverse psychological reaction to not include a mental disorder. A mental disorder means a mental disorder recognised under DSM 4 which in Schedule 6 is defined as ‘the 4th edition of the Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders, text revision (DSM-IV-TR) published by the American Psychiatric Association in 2000.’ There is no reference to DSM 5 in the CLA or it regulations. Therefore a mental disorder that is not in the DSM 4 could still be an adverse psychological reaction to physical injury even if it is not a mental disorder for which general damages based on the PIRS and ISV system could be awarded. If there is no physical injury and only a DSM 5 (but not DSM 4) condition then general damages might still be awarded under s 5 of the regulations and s 9 of Schedule 2 Part 2 of the regulations as they allow for general damages assessments for injuries not listed in the regulations.