Speech: Rahui Katene - ACC
te-pati-maori
Tue Mar 10 2009 13:00:00 GMT+1300 (New Zealand Daylight Time)
Speech: Rahui Katene - ACC
Tuesday, 10 March 2009, 5:23 pm
Press Release: The Maori Party
Urgent debate on the decision to remove the chair from the Board of Accident Compensation Corporation
Rahui Katene, MP for Te Tai Tonga
Tuesday 10 March 2009; 4.20pm
I am somewhat bemused at the reaction to the announcement from the Minister that ACC needed a fresh start to face up to its funding issues. What is so wrong with a fresh start?
In all other spheres of the world, it seems that the deteriorating economic forecast is dominating our thinking.
We are calling for results based accountability – funding for outcomes – efficiency of services; better targeted support.
And let us not forget we are talking about an agency in which a shortfall of $1.5 billion is supposedly of such little interest to its management that it was deemed unnecessary to disclose the amount in the statutory Pre-Election Fiscal Update.
Three whole months before the 2009 Election, the ACC Board had recommended that more funding would be required – specifically $1.559 billion over the next five years – including $307 million in the current year.
Despite the requirements that every good public servant knows around limited powers – officials in ACC and Treasury had not deemed it necessary to pass on.
On top of the PREFU, we then received the latest six monthly Price Waterhouse Coopers valuation of ACC’s liability. In this report, it is revealed that ACC’s liabilities have increased to $21.875 billion with dramatic increases in the earners levy and the vehicle levy.
Today New Zealanders have had to accept the shock announcement that the motor vehicle levy will be increasing by $32 from 1 July 2009.
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On top of that, the motor vehicle license fee for a petrol car will increase from $136.44 to $168.46 and the ACC petrol levy will rise from 9.34 cents per litre to 9.90 cents per litre.
To many in this House those numbers may just seem like dollars and cents, and hardly the stuff to get concerned about.
But for my constituents, the constituents of Te Tai Tonga, these dollars and cents come at a time when they least can afford it.
The families in my electorate are on a median income of $54,500 – for an entire household. That’s a whole five thousand dollars less than the median family income for New Zealand – and for many of the people in this establishment it’s an income level that might be too low for even an individual; let alone a family.
But that’s not all that we need to think about when we think about ACC – bad enough as it is.
And I want to drill down further into the experiences of our constituents with ACC – specifically the experience of Maori.
What all the research tells us is that the comparisons of need to actual care consistently show us that across the health sector, Maori have greater need but less access to treatment. We have seen this for heart disease, for respiratory health, for cancer, for stroke – the list goes on.
The data that is particular to ACC reveals that Maori are not receiving the entitlements that they should in the areas of care, rehabilitation and compensation.
They are not receiving the entitlements at a level comparable to the proportion of Maori in the population.
And so we have to ask why.
I ask again, whether the case of a new chairman for ACC justifies the use of the urgent debate formula.
Now the situation that really should warrant urgent consideration is the situation outlined by Dr Peter Jansen of Mauri Ora Associates.
His research, Maori consumer use and experience of health and disability and ACC services, is fascinating reading for us all.
Because what it reveals in some depth, is that the reasons for the large health disparity include ;
* Barriers to access
* Barriers to treatment
* Provider behaviours
* Cultural competence
* Institutional racism
* Differences in utilisation
* Lack of knowledge by Maori patients and Maori preferences for care.
Mr Speaker, I know this is not news to any one in the House.
But it should be.
What could explain why so little has been done to address this situation?
We know that Maori are dissatisfied with the care they receive, and with the barriers to care.
Now is the time to do something about this.
In our worldview, we have a saying :
Ruia taitea kia tū ko taikākā anake.
Strip away the sapwood, gather only the heartwood
It literally means, clear away the rubble in order that we can get to the heart of the matter – the ultimate outcomes for health and care.
We are not about to say that an individual – Ross Wilson or John Judge – is capable or incapable of earning the trust of the public. That is not our place – and it is certainly not appropriate to target or finger point at individuals.
But we do believe it is useful to look afresh at ACC. The Ministerial inquiry; the funding shortfall; the continuing saga of ballooning ACC entitlements and levies signalled this week, are all vital areas of examination in their own right.
But overlay the situation for Maori on top of this context, and it most certainly appears to us, that nothing could be that wrong with taking a fresh approach, a new look at a system which is clearly experiencing some problems.
So in the interests of our constituents; the interests of Maori; the interests of taxpayers and everyday New Zealanders; we say, let us be brave enough to withstand the challenge of change, and let us look anew at ACC.
ENDS
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