The NSW government’s plan to retrospectively slash workers’ compensation benefits has already passed through the state’s lower house with 65 to 24 vote!
WorkCover NSW bill clears lower house
The Legislative Assembly voted 65 to 24 to pass the coalition’s plan to rein in WorkCover’s deficit of more than $4 billion shortly before 11pm (AEST).
Treasurer Mike Baird said the workers’ compensation scheme should have been reformed many years ago.
“If we do not act tonight then the workers are left with no scheme and no support,” he told the chamber on Tuesday night.
“Ultimately, what we are doing today is responding to something that should have been done many years ago.”
Former premier Nathan Rees was kicked out of the house by Speaker Shelley Hancock during Mr Baird’s address for interjecting.
Earlier on Tuesday, Premier Barry O’Farrell unveiled the government’s plan to retrospectively slash WorkCover benefits, cap medical expenses for one year and abolish claims for injuries sustained travelling to and from work.
The changes adopt many of the recommendations of a parliamentary inquiry which last week called for major changes to rein in a deficit of more than $4 billion, which the government says risks pushing up premiums by 28 per cent.
Among the retrospective reforms, weekly benefits will be reduced after 13 weeks, replacing the current system of a 100 per cent payout for 26 weeks.
There will be a five-year cap for weekly benefit payments, with an exemption for the seriously injured.
A one-year cap for the payment of medical benefits will also be introduced, also with an exemption for the seriously injured.
Cover for strokes and heart attacks will only apply where work has significantly increased the risk of occurrence.
Mr O’Farrell said the changes would make WorkCover “fairer and more sustainable and encourage injured workers back to work”.
The workers compensation deficit was growing by $9 million a day, he said.
“This scheme was never about providing all injured workers with support for life. This scheme was about trying to encourage workers who have been injured, who are capable of returning to work, to get back to work,” Mr O’Farrell told reporters in Sydney.
“But equally these reforms are about ensuring that those who are severely injured, totally incapacitated, that there will be the ongoing support they deserve.”
“This is legislation that is going to be rushed through parliament, that is going to see injured workers badly affected by these changes,” Opposition Leader John Robertson said.
Unions NSW secretary Mark Lennon said Mr O’Farrell was intentionally rushing the legislation through to “confect a crisis” that didn’t exist.
Federal Workplace Relations Minister Bill Shorten told parliament Mr O’Farrell was “going after” seriously injured workers.
But business groups have welcomed the reforms, which Australian Industry Group’s NSW director Mark Goodsell said were a “long overdue step towards bringing NSW in line with competitor states”.
View the original story with video
Shortlink: http://aworkcovervictimsdiary.com/?p=10006
Victims pay the price of changes to compo scheme
Anna Patty State Politics
June 20, 2012
PAYMENTS for medical expenses will be cut off after 12 months under retrospective changes to workers compensation.
The Minister for Finance and Services, Greg Pearce, yesterday introduced a bill to amend the Workers Compensation Act in response to a parliamentary inquiry into the scheme. The amendments will also cap weekly workers compensation benefits after five years.
However, the Herald understands that Liberal MP Mark Speakman, who was deputy chairman of the committee, yesterday told a party room meeting that he was concerned about the minister’s decision to make the reforms retrospective.
Mr Speakman also expressed concern the threshhold for lifetime payments for the most serious injuries had been set too high.
People will not receive lifetime payments unless they are assessed at a level of 30 per cent whole person impairment.
The secretary of Unions NSW, Mark Lennon, said the new workers compensation legislation was ”appalling”.
He said the majority of people would be cut off weekly benefits after 2½ years and very few would continue to receive them after five years.
”Whether it be caps on medical payments, the ability to get lump-sum compensation, the removal of journey claims, it is simply an appalling attack on workers’ benefits,” he said.
”If the legislation goes through it will mean the people of NSW will have the worst compensation benefits in the nation.
”It is all about lowering premiums and not about genuine reform.”
Mr Pearce said changes to weekly benefits, medical costs and the duration of cover would apply to existing claims.
Changes to lump sum compensation would apply to existing claims from the date the legislation is introduced.
The changes include the introduction of a one-year maximum period for the payment of medical expenses from the date a claim is made, with the exception of seriously injured workers.
Weekly benefits will be capped at five years to encourage people to return to work.
Injured workers will need to meet a 10 per cent whole person impairment threshold to access lump sum payments, which will no longer include a separate category for pain and suffering.
Mr Pearce said the WorkCover reforms would ensure injured workers get the treatment they need to return to the workforce.
“The government has a clear focus to ensure the scheme gets back to meeting its key aims – supporting injured workers through rehabilitation, getting them back to work, and remaining financially sustainable,” Mr Pearce said.
“The workers’ compensation scheme has been costing the state up to $9 million a day and it’s time to put the plan for recovery into action.
“Its $4 billion deficit is spiralling out of control and we simply cannot afford to wait around.
“The reality is without these reforms, NSW businesses were facing premium hikes of up to 28 per cent, an increase which would stall economic growth and job creation.”
The Opposition Leader, John Robertson, said the reforms meant injured workers and their families would be worse off because ”Barry O’Farrell is on an ideological jaunt to cut the benefits to injured workers in NSW”.
”This is a mad rush to cut costs,” he said. ”This is an outrageous attack to a system that provides medical expenses and gets people back to work”.
The federal Workplace Relations Minister, Bill Shorten, accused the NSW government of ”going after” injured workers.
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/victims-pay-the-price-of-changes-to-compo-scheme-20120619-20m78.html#ixzz1yHPSNIWf
I am taking the liberty to republish John McPhilbin’s testimony to the [bollocks] “inquiry” into the NSW workers compensation scheme…
I went on record in parliament and I need to do it again. The O’Farrell Government have no idea what they
are pushing for – nor the consequences it will have.
Transcript 28/05/2012 #3 (page 77-78)
Mr McPHILBIN: I have been waiting for this opportunity for a long time—nine years in fact. I have
prepared a brief statement so I cover all the points I need to cover. It will be very short and to the point. In 2003
I was forced onto workers compensation as a result of a work-based injury. I suffered a psychological injury as a
result of workplace bullying. I had blown the whistle on the culture of workplace bullying and corruption and
was subsequently fired as a result. My former employer at the time, Chubb Security, was subsequently fined by
both WorkCover and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission for major violations of
occupational health and the Trade Practices Act. The fines totalled in the vicinity of $2 million. Unfortunately a
person lost their life as a result of the occupational health and safety violation. I cite these facts because they
highlight the type of hostile and corrupt culture that was pervasive at the time. It appears that things have not
changed much.
My claim was initially declined and I was forced to fight for basic entitlements from the Workers
Compensation Commission. I was successful in winning my case. However, that was only the beginning of the
nightmare. Despite suffering from major depression as a result of the ordeal I received very little help from the
insurance company. It took the insurance company, even after years of lobbying New South Wales politicians
for help, six years to provide me with the support I desperately needed. I was left with very little support from
the system for six years. In fact, from 2003 until late 2005 I was subjected to numerous psychiatric assessments.
Many of the recommendations were routinely ignored by the insurance agent, CGU. I found that many of the
claims managers—and there were quite a few of them—were very unhelpful and hostile and condescending at
times. A lot of the recommendations that were put forward by all of these psychiatrists were a complete change
in career.
From late 2005 to 2009 I received little or no contact from the insurer. However, when I was finally
contacted I received an apology for the failure of previous case managers to appropriately assist me at the time. I
found this incredibly insulting. This meant that I was left to languish for far too long and almost lost everything
as a result. I even contemplated suicide on my darkest days. The system, in my opinion, is not designed to meet
the real needs of injured workers and their families. In fact, it only adds insult to injury. Just last week I
completed a course for a degree in Applied Social Science, paid for by WorkCover, which I think highlights
their understanding of their own failures in the past regarding the management of my case. It has cost them
$45,000 to re-educate me, which could have been done years ago, instead of just letting me hang.
I also intend to pursue a career in helping change the current system to better aid injured workers and
their families and get them the care and justice they deserve. Then again, I am not sure what employer would
employ me after being on workers compensation for nine years. I also believe there is a culture of bullying of
injured workers by many employers and insurers. I heard in the previous testimony the amount of problems that
injured workers have with their employers. For example, in a survey conducted by the Injured Workers Support
Network, which Ms Michelle Burgess will be bringing up, uncaring and hostile employers and insurers were
cited as a major source of distress for many injured workers. My experience proves that for me. I believe in
those results.
In too many cases injured workers report that employers do everything they can to stop you from
returning to work—I think that was mentioned also by the previous people—and that insurers attempt to bully
them and their treating doctors into treatment schedules rather than more medically accepted treatment
standards. In fact, a recent example of this comes from my former employer Chubb Security, which highlights
the contempt many employers, I believe, have for injured workers. This came out on 13 May 2012: “Chubb
Security boss apologises for ‘oxygen thieves’ email slur”. The article states that “A Chubb Security boss was
forced to apologise to workers and undergo counselling after circulating an email describing injured cash-intransit
guards as “oxygen thieves”. It goes on to say that the email was sent by Chubb’s national security
manager Brian Lee, when responding to a request, “You don’t have anyone there on workcover who can pick up
one of my guys from Airport on 2nd May?” He responded, “I have plenty of oxygen thieves, but they can only
work limited hours, so I may need to use a couple of them depending on the amount of time needed.” The article
goes on, “The remark referred to guards injured during cash-in-transit robberies or those on restricted duties
because of post-traumatic stress disorder.”
I also believe that attempts to step down payments to injured workers as an incentive for staff to return
back to work has had the opposite effect. Being routinely bullied by the system despite being seriously injured
or ill has never been the answer. Recent allegations of a growing lump sum culture miss important facts: Who
would want to live this way for the sake of financial gain that is virtually impossible to realise? Reaching a level
of permanent impairment that allows for lump sum payments in New South Wales is virtually impossible. I
believe that these and other failures have and continue to have an adverse effect on injured workers and their
families’ lives. For example, the Injured Workers Support Network survey revealed that 59 per cent of injured
workers reported—and this is a sample of 300, by the way, so it is a very robust sample—having contemplated
suicide as a result of their injury in the last six months; 55 per cent said their relationships had suffered
significantly; 34 per cent said they were now separated or divorced; and 65 per cent said their health was much
worse off than before their work-related injury. I believe all of these statistics, in my experience, are accurate.
It is my view that a comprehensive review of the claims management process is badly needed because
it seems clear that the hostility that many injured workers receive is actually delaying recovery and making life
miserable for many in the process. In too many cases thoughts of suicide are a constant companion.
Anti-bullying policies and policing of hostile and unfair treatment by employers and WorkCover insurance
agents need serious consideration, in my opinion.
By the way, how true! [Received via email from our friend "The Applicant" with thanks]
SCREW PARLIAMENTARY PRIVILEGE – IT”S GLOVES OFF!!!!
A comment on your submission via Facebook is so well formulated that I took the liberty to copy and paste it here:
“Very well said. And a good example of if things were done when needed…ie better use of resources tied to outcomes. And the practise of paying bonuses to CMs for getting rid of claims needs to be made illegal. Let the injured workers give feedback and let their bonuses be paid on an aggregate score. In sales its well known that not providing good customer service and only focusing on sales, actually costs more money and makes less money because of having to deal with angry people and problems all the time. And WC is the same.”
Question for Barry O Farrell and Greg Pearce
I was medically retired by my employer while on workcover -what happens here Einsteins ?
Fatty O’Barrel you will be the cause of many suicides and increased poverty across this State. SCUM and PARASITE will be the definition of you for many injured and non injured. You will be a 1 term Government.
To add to the confusion of it all:
NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell has flatly denied his WorkCover overhaul is retrospective.
NSW WorkCover overhaul ‘not retrospective’
NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell has flatly denied his WorkCover overhaul is retrospective.
“No they are not,” he said on Wednesday, a day after the controversial reforms passed the lower house.
“The changes simply mean if the parliament passes the laws, the laws come into effect from the day the government signs off on them and from that moment on they take effect.”
Mr O’Farrell compared it to speeding fines.
“You find the week after we put them up the people who got fined two weeks earlier do it under the other regime,” he told ABC Radio.
The Legislative Assembly voted 65 to 24 to pass the coalition’s plan to rein in WorkCover’s deficit of more than $4 billion.
The changes are expected to go before the state’s upper house by the end of the week.
Mr O’Farrell said reports that medical benefits would be cut off after 12 months were also wrong.
“That, in the vernacular, is BS,” he said.
“The fact is that under the proposals put forward, medical benefits terminate a year after compensation payments cease.”
The premier said workers who broke their leg and were off work for four years would get compensation payments for that time.
“Then between four and five years you still get your medical expenses for that paid – that’s where the 12 months cuts off… it doesn’t cut off 12 months after the injuries occur.”
Mr O’Farrell rejected claims from Federal Workplace Relations Minister Bill Shorten that he was “going after” seriously injured workers.
“There are people who are severely injured and totally incapacitated and under our changes their benefits will actually go up,” he said.
“But for other people, whatever their injury, there will be WorkCover testing to assess whether or not they can go back to work.”
Mr O’Farrell said he had “real concerns” about how lawyers and doctors had used the scheme in the past, and it was time for it to be financially sustainable.
Unions NSW secretary Mark Lennon said Mr O’Farrell’s claim that the changes were not retrospective demonstrated that he didn’t understand the legislation.
“This is cruel, retrospective legislation that pulls the rug from under sick and injured workers,” Mr Lennon said in a statement.
“We know of specific cases where grieving widows who were set to seek compensation for nervous shock will now be denied the right to even make a claim.”
Mr Lennon pointed to schedule 12, clause three of the new laws, which he said clearly stated the changes could be applied retrospectively.
Sydney-based personal injury lawyer Ivan Simic agreed that the laws were retrospective and workers who’d made claims under the old regime would be immediately affected.
“It’s going to affect the vast majority,” he told AAP.
“The starting point for the legislation is that it applies to all injuries and claims that were made before the date of the commencement of the Act.”
Mr Simic said the only people who would be exempt from the changes were police officers and coal miners.
“If you’re a police officer good on ya – you’ve got a gold pass,” he said.
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/national/8486560/nsw-workcover-overhaul-not-retrospective?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
this is from an ABC Radio interview this AM.
I hope the below helps with alleviating the great deal of frustration.
Obviously there are still many other aspects of the reforms which are crazy. And the point taken is the cost shifting from State to Federal with the compo systems looking to re-arrange the perception of a ‘medical’ debt to medicare, putting it in obvious terms.
“The fact is that under the proposals put forward, medical benefits terminate a year after compensation payments cease.”
The premier said workers who broke their leg and were off work for four years would get compensation payments for that time.
“Then between four and five years you still get your medical expenses for that paid – that’s where the 12 months cuts off… it doesn’t cut off 12 months after the injuries occur.”
Point in fact is that at this stage we cannot possibly believe what Barry says – he has been contradicting himself on more than 1 occasion and as pointed out by the lawyers in the above article “nsw compo overhaul not retrospective”
“Sydney-based personal injury lawyer Ivan Simic agreed that the laws were retrospective and workers who’d made claims under the old regime would be immediately affected.
“It’s going to affect the vast majority,” he told AAP.
“The starting point for the legislation is that it applies to all injuries and claims that were made before the date of the commencement of the Act.
Barry does NOT understand the legislation -Mr Lennon pointed to schedule 12, clause three of the new laws, which he said clearly stated the changes could be applied retrospectively….
Well Greg Pearce stated on 2gb this morning that they are retrospective. He went on to say its like when new Tax laws start, they effect all.
Which Parasite is running the Show and who’s telling the truth, Fatty O’Barrel or Pearce?
The liberal Government be it state or federal are untrustworthy Vermin. Remember this injured and non injured, The Liberals agenda is always to look after Business.
let’s just say the 300 pages issue paper is as clear as mud.
have to wait and see the hard way