By Stuart Eustice, Partner, and Lidia Martinez-Chavez, Lawyer

Background

In Spotless Facility Services Pty Ltd v Victorian Workcover Authority [2025] VSCA 50, the Victorian Court of Appeal was asked to determine whether Spotless Facilities Services Pty Ltd (the Applicant) was liable to indemnify the Victorian WorkCover Authority (the Respondent) for compensation paid to a worker who had fallen during a busy lunchtime period in the Dining Hall of Geelong Grammar School. The worker had slipped on a liquid spill believed to be soup and sustained a cervical spine injury.  At the time of the incident, the Applicant held two contracts with the school to provide catering and cleaning services, which included responsibility for the Dining Hall’s maintenance.

Subsequent to the worker’s injury, he successfully claimed worker’s compensation, and the Respondent commenced recovery proceedings against Spotless under section 369 of the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Act 2013 (Vic).

Trial Decision

At first instance, the Court found in favour of the Respondent. The Court concluded the Applicant had breached its duty of care by failing to implement a reasonable system for the inspection and cleaning of spills during meal service. Although the cleaning contract referred to “continuous spot cleaning as required,” the Court held this implied a duty not only to respond to spills once reported but also to actively inspect the floor. Relying on the foreseeability of spills in a crowded, self-service dining hall, the Court found the Applicant’s reliance on passive notification was insufficient.

On causation, the Court reasoned that given 90 minutes of meal service had elapsed before the incident, and no proactive inspections had occurred, it was more probable than not that the failure to inspect had contributed to the accident.

Appeal

On appeal, whilst the Court accepted Spotless owed a duty of care and had breached it, they however disagreed with the trial judge’s findings on causation.

The Court held that the evidence did not establish, on the balance of probabilities, that a reasonable inspection system would have detected and removed the spill before the worker fell. Unlike the circumstances in Strong v Woolworths Ltd [1], where the hazard could have existed for many hours, the evidence here showed that the Dining Hall was relatively quiet before 12:30 pm and only became extremely busy closer to 1:00 pm, around the time of the incident. This timing suggested a significant possibility that the spill occurred shortly before the fall, meaning a reasonable inspection regime, even if in place, may not have prevented the accident.

The Court emphasised that causation required more than speculation or possibility; it had to be shown as probable, and the Respondent had failed to evidence this.

[1] (2012) 246 CLR 182.