McLellan TraceyDr TRACEY McLELLAN (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. What the member who has just resumed her seat lacked in longevity I will make up for in the next 10 minutes. So never fear; ACC won't be going anywhere soon.Grant McCallum: Neither will you.Dr TRACEY McLELLAN: Neither will any of us. A little fun fact before I start and provide you with a bunch of fun facts. Talking about technical fixes and technicalities and things like that it was mentioned earlier that it was 1 June but of course because we're in urgency it is still the 30 May. Therefore many things remain the same including the fact that it is still Mike Butterick's birthday so he is a very lucky man. I hope that his colleagues have been showering him with gratitude attention presents and all those sorts of things.Hon Members: And cake.Dr TRACEY McLELLAN: And lots and lots of cake. It is incumbent upon them to do so.We are now on the second reading debate of the Accident Compensation (Interest on Instalment Plans) Amendment Bill which we are supporting. We are entering into this process under urgency so it feels a little bit weird to have to read a regulatory impact statement sort of digest everything and quickly see if there are any issues before we have the Minister in the seat—and I can see him preparing doing some deep meditation over on the other side of the House before he before he regales us with all his wisdom on ACC. But that's good. There's nothing wrong with preparation and a calm attitude. We have several questions for him so that should be good.Some of the contributions have been very brief so it feels like it's been a bit of a long time before we've actually just got back to basics so let me cover off some of the basics now. The problem with this is that essentially ACC have been doing something and only now has it come to light that probably not everybody would agree with the correct interpretation of how they should be doing it. And I think that the lack of clarity or the issue has arisen because of the definition of what an administration fee is versus what the debit interest on the instalment plan is.When paying by instalments the Act allows for ACC to charge a reasonable fee to recover its costs of collecting any levy instalments. And as Rachel Boyack pointed out I think earlier or it may have been Ingrid Leary section 234 of the principal Act is where you'll find that information. Once a levy payer agrees to use an instalment plan then the fee becomes part of the associated levy for collection purposes which is perfectly fine and makes sense.But alternatively if the levy isn't paid by the due date and an instalment plan hasn't been agreed to ahead of time then penalty interest begins to accrue and obviously that's a situation that's not ideal. When we think about ACC when we think about our businesses our small businesses our sole traders the breadth of people that pay ACC instalments it's incumbent upon all of us to make sure that it's something that people buy into that people contribute to and that they do in a timely way and that it's not onerous on them and it doesn't put their business at risk and therefore doesn't put at risk a system that we all rely upon.So if people are paying penalty interest because the instalment plan is not the favourable option then I think it's perfectly proper for us to fix up anything that could cause that confusion. So as Rachel Boyack said earlier the fee for the 10-month instalment plan is currently inclusive of debit interest and we've established that; that's fine. And ACC has interpreted the Act as allowing it to charge that particular debit interest where reasonable.And it's interesting—I find it interesting and others may agree—that due to the changes in IT systems and obviously staff turnover—and we're talking about a period of 20 or so years and people come and go. So due to changes and staff turnover ACC can't actually be sure when this practice of charging interest started. At first read you may think that feels a little bit odd but when you think about it that's not that uncommon as things change. But it is confident that it has charged interest on the instalment plans of various lengths since at least 2004.The other thing is that as I think we mentioned earlier the view of the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment (MBIE) is that they don't believe that the relevant sections of the Act provide for ACC to actually charge that debit interest as part of the instalment fee. And as we've talked about it's not unusual—and the Minister has pointed this out himself—for ACC or anybody to think that what they've been doing isn't necessarily the correct interpretation. So it is important for us to be here tonight—or not necessarily tonight. It's interesting because I imagine it has to be done in a timely manner and maybe Rachel Boyack will talk about that later but it's interesting; I would expected that it was done maybe a bit sooner.Hon Chris Bishop: Well you were in Government and could've done it and you didn't.Dr TRACEY McLELLAN: Well no a little bit sooner in this urgency process. [Interruption]ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O'Connor): Patience; you'll all have your turn.Dr TRACEY McLELLAN: It's fine. I'm more than happy for people across the aisle particularly Ministers to make a contribution and soak up some of that time. I think was about 15 or 18 seconds so Chris Bishop you're on fire.Thinking about ACC though—and it's a bit relevant to the previous outburst—there are plenty of things that ACC do not cover and there's lots of things that they do and we've had some discussion tonight that isn't technically part of this but I think it's worth thinking about as we prepare the questions for the Minister in the next stage of this process and I know that my colleagues will be looking at various other bits and pieces of that as well.So MBIE have obviously done the work. A regulatory impact statement has been produced and as people know they have to look at options counterfactuals and various other considerations. And MBIE have recommended the approach we've taken tonight but they've also warned as my colleague Reuben Davidson said that it could attract some public scrutiny around ACC's past and current charging of those instalment plan fees. I think there's always a risk when something comes to light and the first rule is to make sure that we correct something as it comes to light but we also need to be mindful that public confidence can also take a bit of a tumble in that process. So this could lower public confidence in ACC so I can see why we need to do this we need to do it now. So MBIE considers that this approach is justified because it ensures that ACC's past and current practice is validated according to the regulatory impact statement to remove any legal risk and so that any future instalment charges are able to be appropriately set in those regulations.I know that the Green Party have said explicitly that they won't be supporting this bill as it goes through the House under urgency tonight on 30 May because of the second part which is about the retrospectivity. I'm sure they will have a host of questions for the Minister and that the Minister will be able to elucidate and maybe allay some of those concerns if he's on top of his game which I'm sure he is.So I think that it's good—Grant McCallum: That'll do.Dr TRACEY McLELLAN: No no—I think it's good to value our ACC institutions to have the chance to think about all the wonderful things it contributes to our society and as we sit here in the House tonight we're presented with an opportunity to make a technical fix on something that will ensure it is in tip-top shape to lead us into the future. For that reason I'm happy to commend this bill to the House at its second reading.