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Sunday Star Times
January 13, 2002
Editorial
Past forgotten in ACC Shift
Once again our flawed and problematic accident compensation regime, in
attempting to take a step forward, has taken more than two back.
It is clear no lessons have been learned at government level from Lynley
Hood's remarkable book A City Possessed. Perhaps unsurprising since most
ministers - among them the strangely ostrich-like Phil Goff - appear not to
have even bothered to read it.
One of Hood's most telling criticisms was of an accident compensation system
which encouraged false sex abuse claims in general and against Peter Ellis in
particular. Forty families claimed payments in that case, although the final
case against him involved just 18.
Despite evidence money was paid out for extremely questionable claims, the
ACC now agrees that from April 1, it will take the word of victims and
counsellors that abuse has happened when deciding to make payments of up to
$100,000. No need to even complain to the police, much less gain a
conviction. The message is obvious - line up and get your dough, few
questions asked.
Lump sums for sex abuse were abolished almost 10 years ago after a cost
blowout. The number of claims related to rape and sexual abuse rose from 221
in 1988 to 13,000 in 1993. Most claimants were automatically paid $10,000 whether
or not they had lodged a criminal complaint.
Now the lump sums are back and with them the likelihood of a return of
baseless claims which fuelled the sex abuse industry Hood so effectively
pilloried. Certainly compensation should be paid where abuse is proven. But
how can this government justify taking such a soft line over proof of sex
abuse when it takes such a hard line elsewhere?
Today, the Sunday Star-Times reports on the case of a woman who was nearly
stabbed to death by a deranged intruder. Worse than her physical injuries,
however, she saw her baby stabbed three times with a carving knife. It was,
as her lawyer points out, an unimaginable horror. But when her stab wounds
healed, compensation stopped. ACC legally could not recognise her severe and
ongoing mental trauma.
Before the last election, Labour promised an ACC revamp, which included plans
to compensate for mental injury, but that idea was quietly dropped as
officials tallied the cost.
Labour Department officials warned it would be difficult to sort out real
claims from frauds. The exception is injury from sex crimes.
And aren't the lawyers stoking up the boilers on the gravy train already. A Christchurch firm has
sent out a million leaflets touting for business from sex abuse victims
entitled to the new payments. ACC, too, is touting for business, sending
doctors 200 cards with an 0800 number to give patients who might want to
claim compensation for sex abuse.
Heaven forbid that anyone might forget they've been assaulted. And heaven
help those who can't forget that they have been.
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