Fitzsimons Jeanette: Injury Prevention Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Fitzsimons Jeanette: Injury Prevention Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Volume:609;Page:6483] 
JEANETTE FITZSIMONS (Co-Leader—Green) 
: 
 I guess the Opposition would not be the Opposition if it did not use every opportunity there is to jump up and down and make political capital when the cost of something goes up and to complain about new taxes. 
Simon Power 
: It’s called politics. 
JEANETTE FITZSIMONS 
: Of course it is called politics and that is what the Opposition does. 
The title of this bill is entirely appropriate because it is about what the money will be spent on. This is not a new tax in the sense of gathering more Government revenue. It is not a new tax in the sense of the money going into the consolidated account. It is additional money to fund the cost of the accidents that occur this year and if motorists want the levy to go down all they have to do is have fewer accidents. 
The Opposition members who oppose funding the full long-term costs of the accidents incurred in a year never tell the House which of the two alternatives to that course of action they would prefer. Do they believe that there should be no long-term funding for full rehabilitation of accident victims? If they believe that we should stick with the present situation—which arose under a National Government that refused to fully fund the tail of long-term rehabilitation of accident victims—they should tell the House honestly that they do not believe there should be full rehabilitation of accident victims. Then motorists could decide whether they thought that was a sensible policy. Alternatively perhaps they think some other part of the economy—some other tax such as perhaps the general taxation fund—should fund the costs of road accidents in which case they should tell the country that as well. Then taxpayers could decide whether they wanted to be responsible for picking up the costs of people who injure themselves in accidents. Opposition members cannot have it both ways. 
The Greens are supporting this bill because we believe in fully funding accident compensation. We are disappointed that there has been no progress since the bill was introduced in terms of shifting the whole accident compensation component off vehicle registration and on to fuel. That would make it easier for young people and poor people to register their cars instead of driving unregistered cars and it would relate the payment to the risk. The car that sits in the garage all day is not having accidents; the car that is doing tens of thousands of kilometres on the road is at much greater risk and the owner should pay more. We believe that the cost of accident compensation should be on the fuel not on the registration. The bill goes some little way towards that in that the whole increase is on the fuel but the previous funding remains with the registration. 
We would also have liked to see a firm commitment to extend this levy to diesel rather than—as expressed in the bill—just having an opportunity to do so. It is quite iniquitous that petrol users should be paying this additional accident compensation levy and not diesel users. Although the bill makes it possible to do that it does not ensure that it will be done and we have a certain disappointment about that.