ACC Documents Reveal Huge Employer Subsidy By Workers

"ACC documents released today reveal for the first time the huge subsidy which injured people are paying to employers," Council of Trade Unions president Ross Wilson said today. "The comprehensive ACC levy consultation documents provide a sound basis for public debate, but it is disappointing that ACC has failed to recommend, and provide for, the reversal of the 1990 National Government decision to introduce co-payments."

Ross Wilson, who is a former Deputy Chairperson of ACC, said it was a fundamental part of the original ACC social contract that medical treatment of accident victims would be paid in full.

"International Labour Convention 17 requires New Zealand to ensure that all workers injured in work accidents are provided with all necessary treatment at no cost to the injured worker," he said.

"The ACC papers reveal that injured people in New Zealand today are paying $330 million in treatment costs which should be paid by ACC and employers alone are receiving a subsidy of $39 million a year in breach of international law.

Ross Wilson said that successive New Zealand Governments have acknowledged to the International Labour Organisation that we are in breach of these international law requirements, and have undertaken to remedy the breach.

"Rather than granting employers a further levy reduction as recommended by ACC the CTU will support the Government in its commitment to remedy this inequity," he said.