Parmar ParmjeetDr PARMJEET PARMAR (National): Thank you Madam Assistant Speaker. As our ACC spokesperson the Hon Tim Macindoe said it's a great afternoon. Yes it is a great afternoon a very peaceful and harmonious afternoon as we are supporting this bill. But I want to also acknowledge the Associate Minister who acknowledged the Hon Michael Woodhouse as this bill was already in the pipeline. This was being worked on. So it was really good to see that the Government has taken this up and very quickly in the year we saw that this bill was referred to the Education and Workforce Committee in May and we closed submissions on 29 June. It was good to see that we received 25 submissions from various organisations and individuals. Out of 25 13 of them came to the select committee for an oral submission. I want to acknowledge them and thank them because it's a great effort made by all of them to pick it up when it came for submissions before the select committee and then make their submission and also appeal before the select committee. So I'm really grateful as the chair of the Education and Workforce Committee to all of those submitters.During the select committee process as other members have said it was actually really good to work with all members and submitters because this is a very straightforward bill which we are supporting as it was already in the pipeline when National was in Government. One change that we made which was about the commencement date in the select committee process was changing it to 1 July 2019. This was mainly to align the changes that we are making through this bill with the funding allocation that is there in Budget 2018. But other than that it was quite straightforward.I want to acknowledge all the submitters and also want to say that some of the things that came during the select committee process were not in the scope of this bill but the select committee has already recommended to officials that that all should be taken into consideration when there are any substantial changes made to the ACC scheme. My understanding is that that is what the Government intends to do. As the Minister said in the first reading speech the Minister wants to bring some substantial changes to the ACC scheme. So I'm really hopeful that the views and experiences that we heard during the select committee process of this bill will be taken into account when the Minister and the Government go ahead with making those changes. Of course they will have the opportunity to come back and talk to the select committee again. Talking about submissions it was really good to hear various experiences from people and it's contributions like those that we had during the select committee process that help us make some meaningful changes.It wouldn't be possible to acknowledge and read through all submissions but I just want to acknowledge one which was from Ernest Heads. It was also covered in the Otago Daily Times. So Mr Heads struggled for several years to get a fair deal. In 2008 Mr Head's wife died after being struck by a car and then he had to go to ACC. He was turned down. ACC wrote to Mr Heads telling him that he was only entitled to receive both his wife's ACC compensation and his national superannuation for one year and he must then choose to receive either the ACC payment for the next four years or keep his super and relinquish the compensation. So these people have had several experiences with ACC. Some were within the scope of the bill but many experiences that we heard were not in the scope of the bill but I still want to thank them for their contribution.So in this bill there are mainly two big—they're not big changes but in this bill compared to other changes there are two big changes that this bill intends to make and we've already heard about those changes from other members. But very quickly I just want to say that one is about bringing fairness for people that get injured close to retirement age because we cannot assume that when people retire at the age of 65 they'll stop working. Our superannuation is not means tested so it is possible that individuals will continue to work. In choosing between their weekly compensation and superannuation they're losing that additional income that they would get. It's a different standard for someone who gets injured close to the age of 65 close to retirement and someone who gets injured before their 64th birthday. So it's really important to bring that consistency into our ACC scheme and that is what this bill intends to do.The second change in this is about making the appeals process consistent because at the moment we have two different authorities looking at the appeals process. To give that opportunity to people where they get a fair go and also they are heard under the same scheme and jurisdiction or legislation it's important that we have one kind of system looking at all the appeals. Currently we have the Accident Compensation Appeals District Court Registry and also the Accident Compensation Appeal Authority. So through this bill we are going to disestablish the Accident Compensation Appeal Authority and the appeals from here will be transferred to the District Court system. That way what will happen is that everybody will have a consistent go when they're making an appeal.Of course we want to look at the sustainability of the scheme—the cost of the scheme. It's going to be around $1.16 million to $1.55 million per annum. We know that around 150 people a year are required to decide between the two options and 80 percent of people choose to go with the weekly compensation because usually weekly compensation as it is 80 percent of their income is more than the superannuation. So based on that it's a very good move. And just like other members who spoke before me I support this bill. Thank you.