Collins Judith: Urgent Debates — Accident Compensation Corporation—Release of Personal Information 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Collins Judith: Urgent Debates — Accident Compensation Corporation—Release of Personal Information 
[Sitting date: 20 March 2012. Volume:678;Page:1074. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon JUDITH COLLINS (Minister for ACC) 
: 
 The people I feel very sorry for in this situation are the 6700 claimants who awoke on Tuesday last week 13 March to a  
Dominion Post 
 front-page story alleging that all sorts of private information had been released to another claimant wrongly and alleging all sorts of things. All these people suddenly thought that their information had been put out in the public domain. These people had done nothing wrong. The first thing I knew about the situation was on Tuesday morning when just like them I read about it in the  
Dominion Post 
. The chief executive found out about it at the same time. He knew on the Friday that there was a query from the  
Dominion Post 
 but it was not particularly specific what the query was about. 
We have had all these people contacted by ACC individually and where they have not been able to be phoned they have been written to to be told what information was actually in that data spreadsheet. It was not full files and it was not full details; it was a data spreadsheet around the appeals that these people had brought. However they should not have had that happen to them. I do not think anybody in this House should take any pleasure in what was quite clearly an inadvertent mistake by a staff member at ACC. Our staff member at ACC was distraught over what had happened and I would have thought any person with an ounce of decency who had received that information would immediately give it back to ACC and alert it to the situation. Or if they were so worried about the privacy provisions provisos and policies of ACC then they could give the information to the Privacy Commissioner along with a complaint. However that did not happen. 
ACC undertook a review of the situation for me and a report and that report was released not only to the media but also to the public on ACC’s website this last Friday. By the end of a few days the information was out. I now understand that the person who had the information—a Miss Pullar—refutes the contents of the report and of course she can take whatever action she likes. But I would say this: anybody with a scrap of decency would have given that information back. I cannot believe that anybody who had it would not do that. I do not care what the excuses are. I do not care what the excuses are about what happened in her case or whatever. At the end of the day mistakes happen. Mistakes are also made by MPs. I am not going to stand up here and defend a letter written by my colleague the Hon Dr Nick Smith. I am not going to defend it. He has already said it was an error of judgment and that he should not have done it. We understand that. 
At the end of the day though there is a genuine concern now over the privacy provisions of ACC. I am personally—not only as the Minister but personally—concerned that people are worried about this and I think we need to deal with that issue. The Privacy Commissioner was brought in on Tuesday as soon as the situation was known and she is working on terms of reference with ACC to go into everything about this. 
Andrew Little 
: It was known in December. 
Hon JUDITH COLLINS 
: The member says: “Oh they knew about it.” No they did not. They did not know about this one. They were told in the meeting and according to the report—and I wish that member would read the report and stop trying to make fun out of this situation—they were told that there was information that was alluded to in a meeting but not actually what was released or where it was. I think that is a situation that should have been followed up better after that meeting on 1 December and the report from ACC admits that. They should have escalated it further up the scale in terms of ACC to more senior management. In my opinion if ACC had these threats made to it then it should have instantly referred them to the New Zealand Police which is the action that I would take in those circumstances. 
The fact is that ACC over the years apparently gets threats all the time. This is not acceptable. Those staff at ACC work very very hard to do a great job for the vast majority of the 1.6 million claimants whom they deal with each year—1.6 million claims each year. That is what they deal with. The fact is that sometimes ACC is going to get people who will not accept what it is trying to do. It is absolutely right that if people do not accept ACC’s decisions they can have meetings. They can have meetings with particular managers they can have appeals and they can do all sorts of things. But at the end of the day in my opinion the ACC staff are trying to do their very best and the last thing that ACC needs to do is what has now happened. ACC has now had to put huge numbers of resources and staff on to contacting every single one of those 6700 people. That is the right thing to do. However if that information had been given back straight away it would not be necessary. Also all of those claimants should not have had to go through that worry. 
The only good thing that I can see out of all this is that there will be a full and thorough review of ACC’s privacy provisions what policies it has and what it has been doing. 
Andrew Little 
: Who’s going to investigate Nick Smith’s actions? 
Hon JUDITH COLLINS 
: This will go through all of these actions. The New Zealand Police has been brought in by ACC and I have to say—that member keeps asking what is going to happen on various things—I actually happen to think that the independence of the Privacy Commissioner and the New Zealand Police is frankly above reproach and should be above reproach in this Parliament. I am surprised that that member does not seem to think that either of those organisations as statutorily independent from Parliament should be able to actually conduct their inquiries. 
I would say to that member who asked the questions that if he actually has any information then why does he not make it available to the Privacy Commissioner? Why does he not make it available? If he thinks there is anything that should be taken further why does he not front up with it instead of just sitting there making baseless allegations? 
I am surprised that the deputy leader of the Labour Party who has resumed his seat should allude to asking what I knew. I am happy to tell them what I knew. I found out on Tuesday that there was a situation. I took action as a Minister should do in those circumstances. I asked ACC to sort this out to find out what was going on to report and to make that report public because I did not want anything being hidden from the public. And I do not think any person in my situation would have done anything other than that. We had 6700 claimants whose privacy had been breached—yes. Was it done knowingly? No not by the person from ACC. Was it breached by someone else? I think so. However the Privacy Commissioner will no doubt look at that too. I would say to anybody that if there is any information that they have relating to this matter that they think will actually help the Privacy Commissioner in her deliberations and her report then I urge them to bring this information to her. If they send me any information I will instantly send it on to ACC or the Privacy Commissioner or both as I see fit. Any information on ACC sent to me is sent straight away to ACC which is what I think should happen. If questions have come out about various things that is what happens. 
 So in terms of where we go to from here I think we should all be looking at the privacy issues of ACC because it has such sensitive information and because it has so much information on so many people. But I am also aware that technology consistently changes and that there are ways in which we need to be able to address that. I can say that the next step that ACC is instantly taking is to set up its own privacy team. It has established a dedicated 0800 number and a team of specialist staff to respond to questions following what has happened. It is putting out a press release today about that and I can tell the House that the contact number for this is 0800 745 254. This information will of course be available on the ACC website. 
This is not something that the ACC staff members wanted to happen but it is not something that has not happened in the past. It certainly happened under other Governments and if the members really wanted me to talk about that I could. But the fact is— 
Michael Woodhouse 
: Go on. 
Hon JUDITH COLLINS 
: Well no I am not going to go on about it unless they want me to—really want me to—because at the end of the day this is actually not a fun matter. This is a very serious matter. I am very concerned that people have been put to a dreadful amount of stress and strain plus ACC has been upended in terms of having case managers come off their work to sit and ring people and let them know what is going on which is the only thing they could do in the circumstances in my opinion. I am pleased that the new chief executive fronted up straight away on Tuesday once he realised what had happened and took responsibility for it and set in train the steps that need to be taken to be able to have this matter resolved so that people can once again have confidence in the ACC privacy systems. 
I will say to members too though that many people who have worked in these sorts of areas—either in law as I have myself or as members of Parliament—will know that we come across some people who are incredibly focused on their issues. They are so focused that they can see conspiracies everywhere and they do not accept that sometimes decisions are going to be made that they find difficult to live with. OK maybe some of these decisions are the wrong decisions but the fact is that sometimes someone has to make a decision then it can be appealed or efforts can be made to overturn that decision. There is nothing wrong with that. There is absolutely nothing wrong with people saying: “I want to appeal. I want to speak to senior managers. I want to do these things.” There is nothing wrong with that at all. But when one receives private information that is clearly not one’s own—clearly not one’s own—it is absolutely wrong to not return that straight away or destroy it. Or they could advise or send it through to the Privacy Commissioner. 
As I say with all the talk that has been going on today if anyone has any information I would like them to please send it to the Privacy Commissioner. My view is very clear. The Privacy Commissioner has wide-ranging powers. The terms of reference I suggest of any report or inquiry should be as wide as possible so that people can be given confidence in the system. 
In terms of the police matter of course I cannot comment on that because these matters are with the police and it would be wrong for anyone in this Parliament to try to comment on matters that are with the police. 
In essence this is a difficult situation. I think ACC has fronted up to it properly and it has admitted fault. It is putting in steps measures to try to deal with this and to alleviate the distress of the 6700 claimants who have been treated so badly—so badly—but it is also looking at how this happened how it can prevent a repeat of it and how it can give confidence to people in the ACC system.