Parker David: Injury Prevention Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Parker David: Injury Prevention Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Volume:660;Page:9232] 
Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour) 
: 
 Amongst the Supplementary Order Papers that are on the Table in respect of the title of this bill is a late proposal by the Government to change the name of the underlying legislation from the Injury Prevention Rehabilitation and Compensation Act to the Accident Compensation Act and I want to explore that proposal. I think we need to look historically at why the current bill name came to be. In my mind there is not much doubt that if members look historically they will see that following the passage of the original accident compensation law New Zealand took its eye off the ball when it came to injury prevention. Prior to accident compensation of course there was a fiscal cost to employers through the risk of court action as a consequence of injured workers suing them which meant that they kept a good eye on injury prevention. 
After the accident compensation legislation came in there was a period when New Zealand’s accident rate in the workplace did not follow the same trend as was the case in overseas jurisdictions. For that reason Governments of the day including the Labour Government decided that there was a need for more interventions to make sure that we achieved what I think everyone in this Parliament would want to achieve which is lower accident rates. 
One of the things that was done was that more focus was put on the enforcement of appropriate workplace safety through the Department of Labour using its regulatory function to ensure better workplace practices so as to reduce accidents. But another thing that was done was a change within the Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) to a greater focus on injury prevention and it has worked. Following the changes that the last Labour Government made in terms of both more regulatory action via the Department of Labour and more focus within ACC on injury prevention that combination of efforts has meant that rather than the trend in New Zealand workplaces going in the wrong direction—that is separating from the international trend where New Zealand workplaces were not improving in their safety at the same rate as was being achieved in other places including Australia—we actually had improved outcomes and less injury. 
I will give an example of where the Government is now reversing that trend and I think this is a shocking example. It relates to a programme that was developed at the University of Otago Faculty of Medicine and has now been rolled out through most parts of New Zealand. It is the Otago Exercise Programme for falls prevention. We heard the Minister acknowledge in this Chamber in just the last few days that more than the work account it is the non-earners account that has increasing costs largely as a consequence of the elderly growing older and many of those elderly falling over in their homes and breaking a hip. 
Sandra Goudie 
: Oh what a generalist statement. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: That has additional medical costs and home-care costs. Sandra Goudie derides that but it has been acknowledged by ACC at recent financial reviews that one of the great problem areas is the growth in falls by the elderly in their homes. 
A programme developed by the University of Otago Faculty of Medicine is directly targeted at the most at-risk group which is made up of people who are more than 80 years old who have already had a fall and who have been identified by their doctor as needing an intervention. It is an inexpensive intervention and unlike most of these programmes it has had extensive peer-reviewed studies by scientists as to its efficacy. That has led to articles in the  
British Medical Journal 
 no less highlighting the programme as an example of injury prevention work that is cost-effective. Indeed the cost-benefit analysis shows that for every $1 spent $2 is saved in the health system in the year following. Yet this Government has cut the funding saying that the programme cannot be afforded. It is nonsense economics. This will see the costs of the accident compensation scheme going up and that is one of the reasons why the Government wants to go back to talking about this being the Accident Compensation Amendment Act rather than the Injury Prevention Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Act. 
The reality is that we are now heading back to the time in New Zealand when insufficient attention was paid to injury prevention. As a consequence New Zealand will go back to where it was under the last National Government. The trends in respect of injury prevention will be bad and therefore the trends in terms of the growing number of injuries and the growing costs of injuries will remain. As a consequence costs will go up rather than come down.