23Additional provisions relating to death of an employee

23 Additional provisions relating to death of an employee

(1) Where the approving authority, after consideration of all the circumstances, directs that, for the purposes of this Act, the death of an employee whose period of service is at least 1 year is to be presumed to have occurred on a specified date, this Act applies in relation to the employee as if he or she had died on that date. (2) Where there are 2 or more dependants of a deceased employee, the approving authority shall, in exercising the powers conferred on it by subsection 16(7) or 17(5), have regard to the respective losses suffered by those dependants as a result of the loss of earnings of the employee. (3) Where an employee dies: (a) the approving authority may, if it has not authorized a payment or payments under subsection 16(7) or 17(5), whichever is applicable, authorize payment of an amount equal to the amount referred to in whichever of those subsections is applicable to the legal personal representative of the employee; and (b) the approving authority shall, if it has not authorized a payment to a dependant, or payments to dependants, of the employee or a payment to the legal personal representative of the employee, of an amount equal to the amount referred to in subsection 16(7) or 17(5), whichever is applicable, within 12 months after the death of the employee or, if the approving authority gave a direction in relation to the employee under subsection (1), the date on which it gave that direction, authorize payment of that amount to the legal personal representative of the employee. (4) Where an amount is payable under this Act to a person, being an employee or a dependant of an employee, who is under a legal disability, the approving authority may, instead of authorizing payment of the amount to the person, authorize payment of the amount to such trustee or trustees as the approving authority appoints to be held by that trustee or those trustees upon such trusts for the benefit of the person as the approving authority directs and, when the amount is paid to that trustee or to those trustees accordingly, the amount shall, for the purposes of this Act, other than this section, be deemed to have been paid to the person. (5) Where, upon the death of an employee, the amount payable under this Act in relation to his or her death would be bona vacantia, this Act does not authorize that amount to be paid in relation to the employee and, if the amount is payable by a public authority of the Commonwealth, the authority shall pay the amount to the Commonwealth.