EMPLOYERS

Art. 1711. Owners of enterprises and other employers are obliged to pay compensation for the death of or
injuries to their laborers, workmen, mechanics or other employees even though the event may have been
purely accidental or entirely due to a fortuitous cause, if the death or personal injury arose out of and in the
course of the employment. The employer is also liable for compensation if the employee contracts any illness
or disease caused by such employment or as the result of the nature of the employment. If the mishap was due
to the employees own notorious negligence, or voluntary act, or drunkenness, the employer shall not be liable
for compensation. When the employees lack of due care contributed to his death or injury, the compensation
shall be equitably reduced.
Liability of employers for death, etc. of their
laborers, etc.
The present articles modified existing laws on compensation of laborers for accident or illness so as to extend better
protection to the laborer. The safety and the decent living of the toiling classes do not affect them alone but are
matters of deep and immediate concern to the entire nation. When in any nation, a large section of the inhabitants are
not afforded a safe and decent life, the economic progress of the country is impeded, and the level of general wellbeing is pulled down. (Ibid., pp. 13-14.)
(1) Liability to pay compensation. Owners of enterprises and other employers are liable to pay compensation
for:
(a) the death of, or personal injuries to, their laborers, etc. arising out of and in the course of their
employment; or
(b) any illness or disease caused by such employment or as a result of the nature of the employment.
(2) Enterprises covered. Article 1711 makes no distinction between the kinds of enterprises; hence, it applies
to all industrial and non-industrial enterprises (commercial and agricultural), as well as to religious, charitable and
educational institution.
(3) Defenses. That the death or injury may have been purely accidental or entirely due to fortuitous event is
not available to the employer as a defense. The employee will not be entitled to compensation if the cause of the
mishap is: (a) the employees own notorious negligence; (b) voluntary act to kill himself or to inflict such injury; or
(c) drunkenness.
(a) A bus inspector riding on the left running board while inspecting tickets of its passengers was held not
notoriously negligent. (Gevero vs. Mindanao Bus Company [C.A], G.R. No. 7434-12, April 5, 1953].)
(b) Failure to avoid a known danger by a laborer engrossed in his work who momentarily forgets it is not
negligence. (Ibid., citing Flores vs. Mindanao Lumber Co., Inc., G.R. No. 43096, May 22, 1936.)
(c) But an experienced laborer, who worked after a rain on a roof the sheets of which have not yet been nailed down
and because of his own weight, the angle of the roof, and the slippery condition of the roof, the sheet slid to the
ground, taking him with it. As a result of the accident, he died. His negligence falls under the designation of evident
and manifest, or notorious negligence. (Caunan v. Compania General de Tobaccos, 56 Phil. 542 [1932].)
Contributory negligence of the employee only mitigates the right to compensation which shall be equitably
reduced.
(4) Arising out of and in the course of employment defined. The first words refer to the origin or cause
of the accident, and are descriptive of its character, while the second, refer to the time, place, and circumstances
under which the accident take place.
By the use of these words, however, it was not the intention of the legislature to make the employer an insurer
against all accidental injuries which might happen to an employee while in the course of the employment, but only
for such injuries arising from or growing out of the risks peculiar to the nature of the work in the scope of the
workmans employment or incidental to such employment, and accidents in which it is possible to trace the injury to
some risk or hazard to which the employee is exposed in a special degree by reason of such employment. Risks to
which all persons similarly situated are equally exposed and not traceable in some special degree to the particular
employment are excluded. (Afable vs. Singer Sewing Machine Co., 58 Phil. 39 [1933].)