Carter David: Injury Prevention Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Carter David: Injury Prevention Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:607;Page:5062] 
Hon DAVID CARTER (NZ National) 
: 
 As I start to speak to this bill it is interesting to note the length of calls that Government members have just taken to justify yet another tax bill before the House today. Here we go again in another attempt to slug the motorist in the hope that the petrol pumps will tick over shortly and another 2.78c a litre will be added to the price of petrol. 
Peter Brown 
: Plus GST. 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: Yes plus GST and the Government cynically hopes that people will not notice the increase. Mark my words: I will be making sure they know that when that new tax increase goes through yet another tax increase is being slugged on to the New Zealand motorist. 
As we debate this bill I recall with interest the election campaign in the middle of last year. Time and time again Government members around the country promised: “Read my lips. There will be no further tax increases.” I have lost count of how many times we have brought legislation into this House recently in an attempt to slug New Zealanders—most of them real Kiwi battlers; middle-income New Zealanders—and here we go again with an unashamed attempt to have a crack at the motorists of New Zealand. There is an awful track record in that regard. Just over a year ago we battled in this House to stop another attempt by the Labour Government to put up petrol prices. On that occasion it put petrol up by 4.7c a litre. Nearly 5c a litre was slugged on to motorists that time and this time it is 3c—in an attempt to make sure that they did not notice it. The justification is that the rise is required to plug further the huge bungling bureaucracy we have around accident compensation. On the matter of the last 5c increase passed in roading legislation I recall that the speeches delivered in the House promising that roading money to all parts of New Zealand were absolutely amazing. 
Hon George Hawkins 
: Take your hands out of your pockets! 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: I will take my hands out of my pockets if it will make George Hawkins feel better. Why does that member not stand and make an attempt to justify the legislation? He is probably not allowed. 
Anyway here we are debating this bill because the current Minister for ACC has contributed to getting accident compensation into a mess. The corporation has come back to the Minister and said that it will need a little more money because money is being spent without any sort of budgetary control. Ruth Dyson has said not to worry because on a Thursday just before Easter the Government will slip in a little bill and put petrol up by 3c a litre—[ 
Interruption 
] The Minister keeps interrupting but as soon as we ask her to repeat what she is saying she cannot remember. Mark my words: I will make sure that residents of the Banks Peninsula electorate will remember this particular petrol increase and I will make sure that they know who is responsible. 
Hon Ruth Dyson 
: They don’t even know who you are. 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: They do not know who I am? I will make sure that they do know who I am. They will know who is responsible and they will also know that Rod Donald put his hand up and supported this 3c tax increase. 
Rod Donald 
: And add it to diesel— 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: No. Rod Donald has not read the legislation. He now says that we are adding 3c a litre to diesel. He is wrong again—which gives me an opportunity to debate the logic of the Greens’ argument. Jeanette Fitzsimons came into the House like a dutiful little puppy dog and said that she would support whatever the Labour Government put before us. Then she came along with the most interesting argument of the lot—she attempted to argue that it was fair that the user paid. She attempted to argue that somebody doing a considerable mileage was likely to have a higher accident rate and therefore should pay more. Is that right? Rod Donald is nodding his head. Well what about all the cyclists who are hurt in this country and require accident compensation support? 
Rod Donald 
: Get rid of cars I would say. 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: Oh so now we are to get rid of cars! I will happily debate that with Rod Donald next time we campaign in the Banks Peninsula electorate. I will happily debate his new policy about how to get accident compensation under control—get rid of cars! That is the logic of the Greens. United Future members at least have had the stomach to stand up this time and say they will not support a tax increase. 
Peter Brown 
: It’s only because they knew the Greens would. 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: I still admire the fact that they have finally come into the House and are prepared to stand on something they promised in the election campaign. That is a vast improvement on what we have seen in the past. But we cannot keep slugging the motorist because $1.7 billion is grabbed from the motorist now in the form of road-user charges vehicle licensing and fuel excise tax. I guess Labour Party people can argue that 3c a litre is not much in amongst $1.7 billion but the point that has been made by members on this side of the House is that at some stage we have to stop slugging motorists. They cannot continue to pay for the inefficiencies and inadequacies of the Accident Compensation Corporation. 
That brings me to my last point. After the 1999 election we stood in this House and watched that socialist Labour Government dismantle the accident compensation industry that existed in New Zealand. We had speaker after speaker from the Labour Party. I guess if I went back through  
Hansard 
 I would find that George Hawkins was allowed to speak in the House. He probably got up and made a speech like this: “Mark my words: ACC costs will not increase.” Darren Hughes the new member interjected in the House only half an hour ago that accident compensation costs had been held. That is the sort of propaganda Darren Hughes is prepared to believe. Accident compensation levies have continued to increase ever since the Government renationalised that industry. The farmers I represent now face— 
Jill Pettis 
: You can’t represent anybody. 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: That member says that I do not represent farmers. I am happy and proud to be here representing the farmers of New Zealand. They do a lot more for this economy than that member has ever done. The point I am making to Jill Pettis—the junior Government whip who used to be in the Speaker’s chair—is that the farmers I represent now face accident compensation costs 60 percent higher than in late 1999. So Darren Hughes tells porkies when he comes into this House—[ 
Interruption 
] Darren Hughes is being economical with the truth if he argues that accident compensation costs have not increased. [ 
Interruption 
] Well get up and take a point of order lazy member! 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Clem Simich) 
: If the member could just withdraw that reference to you know what. 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: I withdraw those references to “you know what”. The point I am making is that accident compensation costs have increased and have continued to increase and it is absolutely unreasonable for any Labour member of Parliament—in this House or outside—to argue that they have not. Only on the eve of Christmas last year that Government increased the New Zealand self-employed levy by 12.4 percent.