Smith Nick: General Debate 
Smith Nick: General Debate 
[Volume:652;Page:1629] 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister for the Environment) 
: 
 Nobody in this Parliament is more focused on the issue of jobs and employment than the Prime Minister John Key who organised the Job Summit last week. This morning I talked with one of the staff members who had lost his job at Sealord which Phil Goff visited yesterday. Let me tell members what he asked me. He asked why when he lost his job at Sealord Shellfish just 12 months ago not a single Labour Minister showed his or her face despite the fact that there were twice as many job losses then as there were at Sealord this week. 
The Leader of the Opposition has become an ambulance chaser rather than focusing on these solutions. In this House we all know that the key to job security is good economic management. Members opposite would have us believe the myth that they left this country’s finances in good shape but I will talk about the cold hard facts that show the mess that Labour left behind. 
Today I released the report from PricewaterhouseCoopers showing that the liabilities of the Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) have blown out to a massive $22 billion. That is an increase from $6 billion a decade ago. The Labour Government has left ACC in such a parlous state that the new Government has no choice but to hugely increase levies or to pull back on the entitlements that have been generously provided by the previous Government but not funded. 
I am advised for instance that in the area of motor vehicle licences to fully fund the scheme the cost will have to go up by more than $150 for each car owner which is over and above the $50 increase the previous Government put in place. 
I am advised that over the next 5 years employers’ levies will need to increase by 71 percent. What will that do for jobs? What will that do for businesses that are on the margin of being able to survive when that reckless previous Government imposed potential costs that will destroy jobs in that area? For earners—and these are ordinary workers who are struggling with the recession—we are looking at increases of 186 percent. 
Let me say plainly what these reports mean for homeowners. Under current policy and legislation in the next 5 years the average homeowner will have to pay an extra $2400 a year in ACC levies. For the average worker it is an extra $1400 per year. Can we allow those sorts of costs to be imposed on New Zealanders when they are facing all the impacts of the recession? 
A further question I ask members opposite is where the moral authority of Maryan Street and Michael Cullen was when they knew about these huge problems in ACC. When they sat and watched the news during the election campaign they knew that the Pre-election Economic and Fiscal Update was dishonest and a breach of the Public Finance Act yet they sat by silently. That is a disgrace. 
The biggest issue of the election campaign was the affordability of policies. The very least that the public of New Zealand deserved was honesty from members opposite and compliance with the law in respect of the problems that had burst out within ACC and its various accounts. The reality is that ACC is effectively insolvent. With ACC’s $22 billion worth of liabilities and its investments obviously performing very poorly there are some very difficult choices for the new Government to make. This new Government is committed to a 24/7 accident insurance scheme but change is needed to ensure its survival.