INDIRECT CAUSATION LIABILITY IN THE WORKPLACE

Meaning and Concept

Indirect causation liability in the workplace arises where an employee suffers injury, illness, financial loss or another legally recognised form of harm that is not produced immediately by the employer’s conduct, but occurs through a chain of events connected to workplace acts, omissions, unsafe systems or third-party conduct.

South African law does not impose liability merely because workplace conduct preceded an injury. A claimant must establish an adequate causal connection between the wrongful conduct and the eventual harm. In delict, causation normally involves two separate enquiries: factual causation and legal causation. The Constitutional Court confirmed this distinction in Lee v Minister of Correctional Services.

Factual Causation

Factual causation usually asks whether the harm would have occurred but for the defendant’s wrongful or negligent conduct. This is known as the conditio sine qua non or “but-for” test.

In workplace situations, the inquiry may involve hypothetical reasoning. For example, where an employer failed to install adequate safety equipment, the court may ask whether the employee would probably have avoided the injury had reasonable precautions been implemented.

However, South African courts do not apply the but-for test mechanically. Where the alleged cause is an omission, systemic failure or multiple interacting factors, a flexible, common-sense evaluation of the evidence may be necessary.

Legal Causation and Remoteness

Even where factual causation is established, legal liability does not automatically follow. The court must determine whether the connection between the wrongful conduct and the resulting harm is sufficiently close to justify liability.

Relevant considerations include reasonable foreseeability, directness, intervening events, proximity and public-policy considerations. If an independent intervening act completely breaks the causal chain, the original employer may not be responsible for the ultimate consequence.

Indirect consequences can nevertheless remain actionable when they represent a reasonably foreseeable development flowing from the original workplace danger.

Case Law

Case Name/Citation: Lee v Minister of Correctional Services 2013 (2) SA 144 (CC)

Facts: Mr Lee contracted tuberculosis while detained in Pollsmoor Prison. He could not identify the precise individual who infected him, but the prison authorities had negligently failed to implement adequate measures for preventing and controlling tuberculosis.

Legal Issue: Whether liability could exist despite the inability to identify the exact immediate source of infection.

Judgment: The Constitutional Court held that factual causation had been established. It rejected an excessively rigid application of the but-for test and found a probable causal connection between the systemic failures and the infection.

Legal Principle/Ratio: Causation must ultimately be assessed on the evidence and probabilities. A claimant does not always have to identify the precise physical mechanism through which negligent systemic conduct produced the harm.

Significance: The reasoning is highly relevant to workplace cases involving disease, unsafe organisational systems, repeated exposure or multiple possible intermediate causes.

Case Name/Citation: Jooste v Score Supermarket Trading (Pty) Ltd 1999 (2) SA 1 (CC)

Facts: An employee was injured after falling at the supermarket where she worked and alleged negligence by fellow employees.

Legal Issue: Whether she could pursue an ordinary common-law damages action against her employer despite the Compensation for Occupational Injuries and Diseases Act 130 of 1993 (COIDA).

Judgment: The Constitutional Court upheld the validity of section 35(1) of COIDA, which substitutes the statutory compensation regime for ordinary common-law claims against an employer concerning covered occupational injuries.

Legal Principle/Ratio: Employees generally obtain statutory no-fault compensation for occupational injuries instead of suing their employer in delict.

Significance: Even where indirect workplace causation can be proved, the appropriate remedy may therefore arise under COIDA rather than an ordinary damages action against the employer.

Case Name/Citation: De Gee v Transnet SOC Ltd 2020 (2) SA 488 (GJ)

Facts: A Transnet employee was injured when an elevator fell while he was travelling toward his workplace in the Carlton Centre.

Legal Issue: Whether the accident arose “out of and in the course of” employment so that COIDA barred his common-law action.

Judgment: The Court held that the stated facts did not establish that the employee was acting within the course and scope of employment when injured.

Legal Principle/Ratio: There is no rigid test for determining whether an indirectly connected accident arises from employment; the factual relationship between employment and the risk must be examined carefully.

Conclusion

Indirect workplace causation requires more than temporal association. South African law asks whether workplace conduct factually contributed to the harm, whether the consequence is legally sufficiently connected, and whether an intervening cause breaks the chain. Where the injury qualifies as an occupational injury, COIDA may substantially determine both liability and the employee’s available remedy.