Logie Jan; Rurawhe AdrianJAN LOGIE (Green): Thank you Mr Speaker. It's a real pleasure to rise on behalf of the Green Party to take a call on this bill. I do just want to provide some context for why I'm pleased to be supporting this today. The purpose of ACC—it's really essential in terms of our entire social safety net in this country.Andrew Bayly: Unbelievable!JAN LOGIE: Unbelievable I'm hearing about that concept that I didn't think was radical. However that is how many people see it in this country. Its purpose is to enhance the public good and reinforce the social contract represented by the first accident compensation scheme by providing for a fair and sustainable scheme for managing personal injury that has its overriding goal of minimising both the overall incidents of injury as well as the impact of the injury on communities including economic social and personal costs. So that's everything that I hope everybody in this House supports in terms of that goal. But there has been a real sense in the community that actually the agency has stepped away from that purpose. The sense of public good has not been actually reflective of the diversity that exists within our public.I have to mention briefly that the first chance I had to participate in an annual review of the agency the chair of the board was presenting; she presented for about 10 minutes and in my analysis of her presentation over three-quarters of her time was spent reporting on the investment profile of the agency. The discussion of the rehabilitative purpose and the support for people in our communities was a minority of her presentation. It really was not a focus of the organisation. That was the chair who was appointed by the National Party. That reflection reflects public concern.I think that I do want to commend the Minister for the aide-mémoires—the briefings—that she commissioned from the agency around how the agency was delivering for Māori for women for disabled people and for Pasifika people last year. When I heard from the initial speaker from the National Party Simon Watts saying that there's no evidence that there is any issue accessing ACC for communities I was just like Do your homework spokesperson!" There's plenty of evidence in those briefings that there are significant barriers to accessing. Just a few of the examples held within those papers are: current ACC data at that point showed that Māori benefited less from the scheme than non-Māori. The disparity is evident across the spectrum from prevention care and recovery. I do want to note that that is in the context of this Government having put in a lot of work in terms of resourcing around the Māori strategy—and actually I will really acknowledge that—about trying to get their agency to be consistent with its obligations around Te Tiriti and delivering for Māori. But that is still the situation that we're in even in that context. Pasifika had a very low awareness of the scheme—that was from research of 2005—or even what they do or how to access it. They are lodging fewer claims and getting even less support than their share of the population—that's even more marked for Pasifika women. Pasifika people return to work more rapidly than other groups. Even Pasifika with serious injuries face significant inequities in receipt of treatment interventions relative to Pākehā.Women—we know that they are being paid out about a billion dollars less than men before the changes to birth injuries which we'll hopefully just start to claw that back just a little bit. Women claim less and are more likely to be declined cover. We know from Otago University legal academic Dawn Duncan's work that the injuries that are most prevalent in female-dominated industries are things that are not covered by ACC currently—so they are burnout and they are mental injury through bullying and harassment in a sustained way that is not currently recognised by the legislation.So the point about actually having the organisation do the research not just of the people who are getting it at the moment is essential if we are to have any hope of delivering for our communities for our public because we are not at the moment.We know that for disabled people—and let me just say that in terms of the paper around ACC's delivery for disabled people they acknowledge that ACC does not record disability status. So putting this in legislation making sure that that basic information is there to be able to meet their needs is a really important step. We know like the disability communities have been telling us for years that the inequity of provision and support available for disabled people—if their disability is a result of an accident versus those where disability is a result of illness or birth—is profound. It is a massive inequity in our community. That is compounded by the fact that people with disabilities going into our ACC system are often put into what they call a "mixed-cause dilemma" about what is the cause of that injury that you have now. Is it a result of the fact that you have this disability or is it a result of this accident? So they are absolutely finding this system a nightmare and there are significant barriers to them being able to access the support that other people in this country are currently able to access. So there is a need.The Greens wrote alongside 27 significant organisations—including unions and the Māori Women's Welfare League and the Disabled Persons Assembly and Help and Wellington Rape Crisis and the Association of Pelvic Organ Prolapse Support—to ACC earlier in the year when there was the new chair of the board and said "Look we know there's legislative change that's needed but there's also things that can be done within the organisation through leadership." So some of that could have been actually commissioning a study by WorkSafe looking at the types of injuries that women commonly suffer in the workplace and in unpaid work that they do at home and caregiving. So this legislation enables that to happen. It gives them the legislative certainty that that is within the framework of their work which they currently don't have.We also noted that the outcomes for claimants deemed vocationally independent needed to be investigated which is about getting the agency to be considering outcomes; not just whether people are no longer receiving ACC and are assuming that that is a benefit. I do hope and will be exploring through the committee whether the framing of these amendments will help us get to that point as well. If we go back to the purpose of the legislation and that public good and recognising the cost of injury on our communities then that takes us to beyond just getting off ACC. We see that in those I think reasonable assumptions we can make that Pasifika are being deemed rehabilitated sooner than all other population groups because actually they can't afford to be living on 80 percent of the minimum wage and function and support their families. So they're going back to work sooner than they should be because they need that additional bit of income. That is not serving I would argue very strongly the purpose of ACC. So we'll be exploring that within the process and also recognising that the procurement model also has an impact in terms of who is able to access the services and whether those services are being too tightly framed to meet their needs.Anyway big long rant. This is a very good step. The Greens would have like to have seen a Te Tiriti clause in here—recognise that that needs to be developed with iwi and Māori. We support that work happening in the interim but this is good progress.SPEAKER: Kua tae mai te wā mō te kai o te ahiahi. Hei te rua karaka ka hoki mai anō. Kia ora.[It is now lunch time. We shall resume at 2 o'clock. Thank you.]Sitting suspended from 1.01 p.m. to 2 p.m."