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Peter Ellis web site -
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Ballooning figures of compensation
paid to alleged sex abuse victims, uncovered by Act MP Heather Roy in questions
to ACC Minister Ruth Dyson, make overhaul a matter of urgency. The legislation must be rejigged
to define a sex crime as an act proved by a conviction or otherwise
established. Too often a sex crime is something that exists only in a
depressed person's false memory. The record shows suggestibility
and political correctness have combined to spawn a monster of unfairness and
waste of public money. High percentage figures of people alleged to have been
violated are bandied about for political reasons, but abuse happens nowhere
near as often as the compensation payouts indicate. The ACC was set up to compensate
people hurt in road and workplace accidents. It commendably replaced the old
court system of suing for damages, a time-consuming arrangement for getting
recompense for demonstrable injuries. The uncritical way it has been
extended to cover dubious mental injury is now seen to be a mistake requiring
prompt correction. I find little that's good about MMP,
but I'm prepared to forget some of its deficiencies if it produces people
like We are also in her debt for
revealing one claimant got the incredible sum of $153,000 in backdated
compensation. This payout was clearly a return to lump sum payments, the
dreadful system that notoriously had ACC staffers offering $10,000 claim
forms to Christchurch Creche parents in March 1992, before Peter Ellis faced
a court. The ACC staff urged parents to get
in quick before the lump sum system changed. The incident was a clear
indication of the way ACC thinks. Nothing has changed. In April 2002 the government
reintroduced potential lump sum payments. It claims it hasn't made any such
handouts, but backdated sums such as $153,000 are clearly a way of making
them in disguise. The weekly amounts paid also are
scandalously out of line with any realistic assessment of the alleged damage
done. Current weekly sex abuse compensation payments start at a few hundred
dollars for poor people but scale up to an unbelievable $1418 a week. This is because some sex abuse
allegations come from people dragging down high executive salaries and ACC
pays claimants 80% of their earnings, no matter how high or low. The law must be changed to correct
this significant injustice. Compensation paid to all acknowledged victims of
sex crimes must be on a flat rate, the same for everyone. Sex abuse victims
don't suffer any greater trauma just because they are in well-paid jobs. Turn the offensive pay-packet
reasoning on its head: the sex abuser doesn't get a heavier sentence if his
victim is a highly paid professional. When convicted his punishment is rated
according to the seriousness of his crime. In the same way the significance
of the trauma he causes must be the only guide to varying the level of
compensation paid to his victim. Perhaps the most scandalous
revelation is the fact total weekly payments are now matched almost dollar
for dollar by payments to counsellors, members of that twilight industry that
has everything to gain by telling people their problems stem from
long-forgotten sex abuse. Counsellors know ACC will pay
their $76 fees if the session uncovers sex abuse, so they have a strong
incentive to find it. The pattern is familiar. A woman
feels depressed, so she finds a counsellor and trots off to an appointment. The counsellor asks her if she has
nightmares. Yes, indeed. Do you lack self-esteem? Yes, I do. Do you suffer from
anxiety? Oh, yes! The counsellor, hiding a satisfied smile, says these
problems are symptoms of long-forgotten sexual abuse. In fact, the more
forgotten the episodes are the more likely they really took place. Well, now, the client says, I
never thought of that, but now you mention it I do remember something
happened, I'm not sure where or when, and I don't remember who the man was.
No, I didn't report it to the police and I'm sure as hell not going to report
it now. But I'm getting more certain, as I cast my mind back, that I was
abused. Somewhere. Some time. Another false recovered memory is
put into the record and before long the taxpayers have yet another leech to
drain away their resources week by week or as a giant backdated lump sum. For sure, some complainants do
cough up facts, but in no other area of crime investigation are complainants
taken seriously if they can't remember when, where or by whom they were
attacked and won't tell the police. It's time for a return to reality. |
