Court Opinion

ID: 7821993
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-09-07 17:58:04.54354+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:30:45.630077
License: Public Domain

Robert H. Dudley, Justice, dissenting. The statutes involved in this case, Ark. Stat. Ann. § 81-1350, et seq. (Repl. 1976 and Supp. 1981), extend the protection afforded by the Workers’ Compensation Act to municipal employees, who were formerly excluded from coverage. The State is required to provide workers’ compensation benefits from the State Fund in the event a municipality does not enter into an adequate contract with a private insurance carrier. In this case an adequate insurance contract existed with a private carrier, the Home Insurance Company, and the State should not be required to provide a part of the benefits. If dual insurance contracts with private carriers existed, it would be fair to require each private carrier to share 50 percent of the liability because double coverage would exist. I do not consider the provocative argument of double payment advanced in one of the dissenting opinions because it was not raised below and was not briefed by either party. However, in this case no double coverage existed because the State Fund was intended to provide benefits only when there was no adequate private insurance contract. The majority opinion treats the private carrier and the State Fund as co-insurors and, as a result, reaches an unfair decision. It is unfair because the Home Insurance Company, a private carrier, received its full premium and now is allowed to shift 50 percent of its just debt to the taxpayers of this State. Such a result was not intended when the statutes were enacted. I dissent.