Woodhouse MichaelHon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National): Thank you Madam Speaker. I join the Minister in acknowledging that today is a milestone day for ACC and the ACC framework that has been in place for 48 years on 1 April this year and was the result of a royal commission report that was released in 1967—long before many of the people in this House were even born. It has endured. It is a world-leading scheme but it was certainly written for a time and in a language that reflected the attitudes of the day. Indeed if one reads that royal commission report women are only mentioned in passing and to the degree where Justice Woodhouse publicly pondered what to do about the housewife that gets injured. Erica Stanford: In the kitchen!Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: It's on about page 115 Mrs Stanford if you want to go and have a read of it. It is a remarkable reflection of the time. But times change and this is an appropriate change to the legislation. As I said in my second reading on the Minister's comments about equity—while I support this and this is a very much a step in the right direction in terms of gender equity in the ACC system—I do urge caution that we try and equalise the number and cost of claims that ACC pays out across the gender divide because actually we know that young men particularly are much greater risk takers and will harm themselves at greater rates and to a greater extent than their female counterparts. On the other hand sexual violence and the sensitive claims that are lodged with ACC as a consequence are disproportionately women. Actually the solution to both of those inequities is to have fewer claims because fewer injuries are occurring. I think we should all agree that that is the equity goal that we seek. In that regard and in relation to maternal birth injuries it's important to acknowledge that on a world standard we have one of the safest obstetric-care frameworks in the developed world and it is certainly much much lower than it was generations ago. But having achieved I think quite significant improvements in care for mothers and babies we have plateaued somewhat over the last 30 to 40 years. And I think it's important that as we collect more data within the accident and compensation system we identify—while it is a no-fault system—what the causes and the potential avoidable causes of harm are so that we can reduce the impact of injuries both to mothers and to babies I mentioned babies in the first and second readings because I believe that there are a number of harms that occur through the birthing process that are not yet covered by ACC—even though I think they should be. And it's incredibly difficult to determine whether or not the sequelae that the baby experiences is a consequence of the labour or birth or existed prior to the birthing process. Now one could argue that the distinction is arbitrary and perhaps shouldn't be there. I think it is important that while we have an excellent scheme we do cover for accidents but there needs to be another look at that. It won't be easy but I think we do need to have a look at how we cover for babies who are born with injuries or with at least sequelae that could be caused by an injury. We heard so many stories in the Education and Workforce Committee of harm and it is a great day because mums will get better care. But I do worry that ACC is becoming in many parts of our health system the default physical and mental health provider. And it's happening because there is frankly better cover and better support if one is able to get a claim accepted by ACC. Now the levy payers are paying for that—and willingly I think—but they're also paying for a health system that I think should be delivering more than it is right now. We are seeing too many examples of waiting and failures in our health system that this Government needs to address. It can certainly celebrate today but it can't celebrate what we are seeing in a growing and increasingly inert health system. Now there were some process questions that I was going to raise in the committee of the whole House. I won't traverse why that wasn't the case but I think we need to actually have a look at it. Now this could be homework for the ACC officials who I know will be listening and the policy team either have or will—or I hope will—address them between now and when the Act comes into force. The first one is in reimbursement for our obstetric professionals where there is a birthing injury in a public hospital. Now it's a bit pointy-headed but normally if one suffers an accident and is taken to a public hospital acute care is provided and ACC doesn't have to provide a direct payment. That's covered by something called the public health acute services levy and ACC is not obliged to pay any more than that. Alternatively a treatment injury occurs while a person is in a public hospital and ACC doesn't pay for that care either. That also goes to the public health acute service levy. With a birth injury what tends to happen is even if it's in a public hospital the person providing the primary care—the lead carer—is either an independent midwife or a private obstetrician. Now—I think quite rightly—if an injury has occurred and a claim has been accepted they have a right to be reimbursed for the extra costs that they have undertaken but the current Act prevents that and I think that needs to be looked at. There is the ACC treatment reimbursement-of-costs regulations and I think maternal care should be put on that list. And a further amendment is required I think to enable obstetricians and midwives to be able to claim for those extra costs. Currently under section 88 they feel pretty unloved by this Government anyway and they're not being sufficiently reimbursed even for the normal labour and birth—much less the many abnormal labours and births that they're going to have to do and the travel. ACC is now covering for acute care and I think they should have a look at that. The other thing is in weekly compensation. We've talked a lot about treatment and rehabilitation but actually a mum who's had a baby and suffers an injury that prevents her from going back to work in the time that she should is eligible for weekly compensation. But what's clear—and I don't think the select committee actually dived deep enough into this—is that there needs to be a reconciliation between that and our paid parental leave and our 52-week unpaid parental leave. Very often mums will apply for the maximum parental leave but have no intention of using it at all. They'll probably go back to work in a couple of months—in less than a year or less than the 26 weeks of paid leave—because it's less than the normal income. If they are injured and unable to do that how is ACC going to distinguish between when they would have gone back and when they've applied for leave? The other thing is: what if the other partner takes the unpaid maternity leave? Is the mum then still eligible for weekly compensation? I think they should be but I don't think we—as a House or certainly as a select committee—had enough of a conversation about the logistics of weekly compensation. It is an issue it will emerge there will be serious harm that will prevent mums from going back to work at the time that they wanted to and that needs to be accommodated. On the other hand we don't want any gaming of the system either and I'm sure that's a very rare thing but it is possible that if somebody could be earning weekly compensation that is greater than the 26-week paid parental leave payments that also needs to be had a look at. So it's a good day but I think there's some work to do. I'll leave it to my colleagues to talk a little bit about gradual process and disease because I was surprised that the Minister talked about firefighters. I would have thought that she might have actually just let that sleeping dog lie. They are not well treated by the scheme. I have said that we should look at a list of conditions where the science is showing that firefighters due to their occupational exposure are at a greater risk of getting cancers than the general population and that they should be included in an ACC scheme. I'm keen to have a look at that when we do get back to Government. But let's finish on a positive: this is a really good bill and I look forward to it passing.