Compulsory Third Party Insurance Regulation Bill

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 30 July 2015.)

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (12:07): I rise to speak on the Compulsory Third Party Insurance Regulation Bill 2015 as lead speaker. I indicate that the opposition has considered the bill and that we will support the passage of the bill in House of Assembly, on the understanding that the Statutory Authorities Review Committee received a referral from the Legislative Council on 1 July outlining the whole issue of privatisation of the Motor Accident Commission for urgent inquiry. Second, I indicate that it is proposed that there will be support of the second reading in the Legislative Council from our side of the parliament, and then there will be a move to refer the bill to the SARC for the inquiry, as outlined.

The government's announcement that they were going to sell the MAC as part of their budget measures came after several years of raiding of the resources of the Motor Accident Commission. It came as no surprise to many of us, who could see that the government, particularly in the last four or five years, has spiralled into the abyss of debt and dysfunction in respect of the financial management of its operations as a government and its fiscal irresponsibility. Whilst it came as no surprise, if one were to review the Motor Accident Commission's annual reports, it would be fair to say that it has undertaken the responsible management of its role as the insurer for third-party claims in respect of motor vehicle accidents.

It has undertaken, responsibly, its other ancillary roles as the nominal defendant in respect of proceedings in that regard. In respect of investment of its assets, one only has to read the annual report of the Motor Accident Commission over the last number of years to see that it is one of the best functioning entities of government—and we see plenty of them. We see plenty of annual reports of departments, statutory authorities and independent and non-independent entities of government as financial corporations and the like.

This is one that actually stands out, I think, as both competently undertaking its work but, in addition to that, has been wise in its investment in respect of its assets to ensure that it can go on into the future and provide the services it does for South Australians and, in particular, users of the roads and, specifically, in response to the injury that may arise out of motor vehicle accidents.

I should not omit, because I do not want it to be ignored, the role the Motor Accident Commission has had in respect of road safety, coupled with South Australia Police, other agencies in respect of emergency services and the education department. There are a number of entities which are in this space in respect of road safety and I do not want to in any way diminish the Motor Accident Commission's role in that. They have run, regularly, million-dollar advertising campaigns to educate the community in respect of road safety.

That being said, the government has used it as not just a cash cow but a raiding bank of assets which they have used to prop up their own budget. I think that is irresponsible conduct on behalf of any government, but it has been particularly identified in the last two budgets of this government. Now they are following through on their promise to no longer be the monopoly provider, via the MAC, of compulsory third-party insurance in this state. It is the government's announcement that it will privatise this area of service under the CTP insurance scheme.

It also comes after the government, under the leadership of minister Snelling in his previous cabinet life, implemented a new scheme of injury compensation through this parliament. We debated it and it has culminated in two things, largely. One is specific provision for those who are catastrophically injured and a lifetime care and support scheme established for those in that category. The opposition supported that under the umbrella of the government's reform proposal to, essentially, establish no-fault claims in that area.

The second aspect of that tranche of reform was to offer a new model of payment, a new schedule of payments, for those who are less than catastrophically injured. It is in this area that the government, under the stewardship of minister Snelling, promised to South Australians that they would have a fair and equitable scheme of compensatory entitlement as a result of being a victim and that it would be expanded to those who had no-one to sue (like the person who was drunk and hit a tree and was seriously injured as a result) and that it would provide a better, fairer scheme and would provide for all of the road users who owned motor vehicles the opportunity of reduced premiums for their compulsory third-party insurance in the scheme.

That was the great panacea of promise. In fact we find that, whilst there is a window of reduction, I think for just a short period, in fact very quickly we are back onto the treadmill of the costly scheme of payments as premiums. And furthermore we find that, notwithstanding the claims of this panacea of pain free compensation and recognition for those who are injured on the roads, that in fact many of them—indeed thousands of them—are not only going to be worse off because they will not be able to have a claim at all but they were not going to receive a recognised award consistent with what had been promised.

The Attorney-General and others in the government made it clear during the course of those debates that a certain model of compensation would be followed (in particular following another state's regime), and what do we find when the dust has settled, when the ink is dry? We find that many in the South Australian community have been deceived into acceptance of a new regime which went from a panacea of relief and equity to a disgraceful abandonment of many.

So I do not have one scintilla of trust in what the government announces in respect of reform in this area. However, those opposite are in government and if they say, 'We are going to privatise this asset', and they can do that by simply saying, 'We're going to take that role out of exclusivity or monopoly of a government entity and we're going to make it available to the open market for other players to come in and provide that service'—in other words, they are going to give up the monopoly and allow that to occur—we know that the government does not need our blessing as a parliament to be able to go down that line. It can do it anyway.

The government can rip out the effective operations of the Motor Accident Commission in this space and it can provide a privatised scheme and it can, as I say, open up to private operators without our blessing. Will it be successful? Will it provide for a better service? Will it provide cheaper premiums? Will it be a better product opportunity for consumers? Well, of course, we are yet to see.

Here is the government's pitch. The government's bill is essentially designed to provide for the establishment and appointment of an industry specific independent regulator so that it can open up the floodgates in the sense of a privatisation, and that may ultimately have some merit in the sense of being a scheme that could work.

However, the government itself says that before it can do that it wants to be able to set up this independent CTP regulator, and that is the purpose of this bill. The government claims that the Motor Accident Commission will continue. It is going to have an ongoing role in road safety and as the nominal defendant. Given the law reforms that we have changed in respect of entitlements to compensation and the limits on the amount that we have passed in the recent regime, the role as the nominal defendant, I would expect, will be significantly reduced; and even if it does not do we need an entire Motor Accident Commission structure to do it? No is the simple answer to that.

This promise by the government in the second reading contribution to this bill that the Motor Accident Commission will have an ongoing role as the nominal defendant is pathetic. Coupled with the fact that it claims that it will have an ongoing role in respect of road safety when there are so many other government agencies who currently undertake that work very well, as the Motor Accident Commission does, one has to ask the question: is it justified to retain an entire commission, with or without a board? It might just be one commissioner sitting in an office with a couple of staff.

I do not know what is going to happen with the Motor Accident Commission, but let me hazard a guess: it will be stripped bare. It will be like a skeleton in the wind. There is no point, frankly, in retaining a Motor Accident Commission if you are going to open up the industry (its principal work) to private operators and then expect that it is going to have an ongoing role in South Australia. That is a nonsense. This statement by the government is purely there and designed to placate those who think that, yes, there is a role for the Motor Accident Commission to continue and to be able to justify what they are doing in this regard.

There is no question that, if you do have a different scheme where you allow private operators in this space, particularly having moved from a monopoly situation, there needs to be some regulation. Whether the structure as proposed in this bill is going to be effective in doing that, again, we will have to see, but that is exactly why this whole matter should be referred to the SARC to deal with the issues thoroughly before we go down this road. So, whilst on our side of the house we accept that the government are entitled to make these announcements (poor decisions they may be) for reasons which they say are justified, let it have the scrutiny of the SARC and let's get on with this bill as part of the general reference of privatisation of the MAC enterprise being referred to SARC for that proper scrutiny. It has already had in its previous terms of reference that that be conducted on an urgent basis, and I accept that that committee can accommodate this part of the terms of reference.

I suppose, at first blush, it raises the question of whether an independent regulator on this model is going to be effective. We had in this parliament all the same promises with ESCOSA, the regulatory regime set up for essential services in this state (electricity and water), and what have we found? We have found that not only have the prices of those things gone up but this government are not backward in coming forward in their nominated minister, including the Premier as Treasurer, issuing ministerial directions to ESCOSA and to that commissioner to undermine the recommendations they made. Independent? What rot.

Ministerial directions in that instance, in respect of the consideration and accounting model that is undertaken for the consideration of the asset base of entities such as SA Water, have been direct ministerial interference with an independent process. Sure, they have the legal power to do it—we understand that—and I think there is always a very strong case for the argument that if a government, and in particular a minister to the cabinet, is responsible for the administration of an entity such as SA Water or any other statutory corporation, then there have to be some reserve powers. I actually believe in that principle. I think that is important, because there is ministerial accountability.

However, what happens in relation to ESCOSA is that this government interferes when it suits them, when they want to get an outcome that supports what they want to do—that is to convince the public that they are going to get something that is improved when, in fact, it is not—and that they are going to be wanting to try and effect the promises, particularly before elections, like keeping prices down for essential services, when it suits them.

So I do not have confidence that the model being proposed as an independent regulator will be an independent regulator because of the conduct of the government in its administration of other allegedly independent agents—and commissions, in particular. However, that is a matter which SARC should examine thoroughly and be able to identify if there is some different way that we should manage that.

It is not as though there are not plenty of examples of commissions in this state. We have a commissioner for just about everything these days under this government. When I came into parliament we had a railway commissioner, I think a roads commissioner and a police commissioner. I think there are about 20 in South Australia now. The most recent, of course, was the KI commissioner, a permanent position. They have different powers and there are different models. I exclude for the moment specific royal commissions which are really like a select committee of inquiry, obviously with royal commission powers, and I am not going to go into that territory today. Obviously, that has a role in the investigation of important state issues.

However, permanent commissioners and commissions have bred like rabbits under this government and they all have different models, they all have different powers and they all apparently report to the parliament but they all have different levels of protection against interference by the government or the minister who they are responsible to. I think the government needs to have a good look at this plethora of commissions and commissioners that it keeps proposing, I think for the specific purpose of trying to alienate themselves from responsibility, claim credit when there is some good news and bag some poor old commissioner who has been appointed if it is not, claiming it to be independent. When it wants to secure an outcome, it gives a ministerial direction.

The public are not that stupid. I think the government needs to take a good look at itself in that regard. However, again, it made the announcement and it needs some protection if we are going to go down the way that the government insists on going. They do not need our blessing and therefore we need to have some proper scrutiny of the regulatory regime that is proposed.

If I were to use an external example, of which I had some working experience, it would be the model in Switzerland which has a different model in respect of health insurance. What occurs there, in short, is that about 90 different companies or entities (some are NGO-based) provide health insurance to the people of Switzerland. The law there says that, if you migrate to Switzerland and become a citizen or you were born in Switzerland, within three months you have to become an insured person. You have to take out private health insurance with one of these 90-odd agencies.

In that scenario there is a base level of obligation and there are other services or areas of medical or hospital treatment that you can buy off the shelf in modules. If you want to buy a special service for optical treatment or a special service for plastic surgery or other areas of health, medical and hospital services then you can pay higher amounts.

It is highly regulated. It is a model which I viewed several years ago now when I visited Switzerland. It was almost by accident because I had gone there to speak with international health authorities in respect of immunisation and a number of other matters, and I came across this regime which I thought was obviously worth having a look at, especially as it was presented as a model which claimed to be effective. When I got to the WHO in Zurich I asked them about it and what they thought because, although they had different areas of responsibility, there were a number of groups who were highly complimentary of how that process works.

You can have a situation where you require, by the parliament, a regulation of the provision of a certain service or product. It is usually within the essential services category. In this area, we have come to have the benefit of protecting those who are injured on our roads, most of all by accident, some, unfortunately, deliberately, and of course there are a small number of cases that are given some retrospective discipline by the criminal law system, but mostly people are relying on their civil rights and entitlements and they need to be able to protect against that. There was a general view that if you are on the road and you are a road user then you ought to be protected against the accidental, negligent or inappropriate, but not criminal, conduct of others on the road. We have come down this path and we need to make sure that, given the government's decision to privatise the MAC enterprise, we do it correctly.

The Legislative Council, in addition to the referral of the privatisation of the Motor Accident Commission to SARC, have also, on 9 September 2015, referred to the 'impact of the lifetime care and support scheme and CTP insurance scheme on persons injured in motor vehicle accidents to the Social Development Committee for inquiry'. Why? Quite simply because the government, as I have pointed out, could not be trusted in what it did ultimately do with respect to the implementation of the new CTP insurance scheme, and that really needs to be considered.

If there was one area that exploded, I think, in the government's face, when it stripped away people's rights in this area, it is to consider members of the South Australian police force. They made it clear, during the debate, that they were concerned about members of the police force who were injured in the course of their duties in their workplace, which sometimes is dangerous and fatal and leaves families either without a mother or father or severely damaged with a catastrophic injury. That is the nature of the risk that they take on our behalf every day, but the government said: 'No, it's all the same,' when we dealt with the WorkCover reforms. Similarly, a scale was introduced which was going to harmonise the claims which have left people out in the cold. People, incidentally, in that area, like the SA Police, who are obviously vulnerable to those risks of death or disability.

The government's position, apart from trying to pretend that this structure is going to give us a fair and affordable CTP scheme and the consumer protection for motorists that it chants on this model and establishment of an independent regulator, has also indicated the following: firstly, that they do not need any legislation to proceed and conclude the process of privatisation, but we agree with them that, if they are going to pursue this option, it needs to be done properly. Secondly, they claim that the current process is that the government, at the RFT stage, has the intention of announcing three to five successful private operators by about December.

I cannot understand how the government could provide such detail if they had not done a lot of work in this area over a long period of time. All that does is heighten my scepticism about how long the government has been working on this process; in any event, that is what their position is. They say that private operators have indicated to them (the government) that they will need about six months to employ staff and establish functioning offices to be ready to service customers from 1 July 2016, which of course is the commencement date for all this.

The government has also advised that they have considerable powers under the existing Motor Vehicles Act and, together with contractual requirements on private operators, that it will be able to conclude the privatisation process. At least that is on the record, that is, an indication by the government that they will require a number of these obligations in the contracts; whether or not that happens, we will see.

They also claim that the same powers under the Motor Vehicles Act will be used to ensure the continuation of the Motor Accident Commission's community programs, such as road safety, etc. As I have said, frankly, it raises the question about whether we will even need a Motor Accident Commission if it is left with such a small workload, important as it may be, when clearly its core business is about to be ripped from it in the same merciless way that its assets have been stripped over the last couple of years.

The government also says—and it is a fair point—that, where a competitive market has been introduced to an area such as this, it needs to have a regulator and that other states which do that (Queensland, New South Wales, and the ACT) have a regulator. Again, we do not disagree with that. We make the point, though, that they have so badly stuffed up so many of these and so badly, I suggest, abused the process in respect of others, including ESCOSA, that we definitely need to have this done properly because we certainly cannot trust the government to do it properly.

For the record, I understand the Hon. Rob Lucas in another place, who has had the management of this bill on behalf of the opposition—and I thank him for his advice on the same—has indicated that the regulatory model has been discussed with the ACCC. They have not identified any concerns with the model. How different it is from models that operate in other states and how responsible the governments are in other states and territories needs to be reviewed.

If in the end it is a situation where the proposed regulatory model of the independent regulator is consistent with other regimes in other states around the country that operate in this way but the only weak link in the proposal in South Australia is the potential interference of the regulator by the government—the practice of issuing ministerial directions, for example, and the general conduct of the government in having the responsible minister in the cabinet—if their behaviour is the weak point, then that is what we need to protect against.

Obviously, we would say, 'Get rid of the government.' However, that is not about to happen. We still have another 2½ years before that can occur, and I do not want to see another important service for South Australians, which is about to embark on a major change of operation, end up in a situation where the service to the public becomes more unfair, potentially more costly and certainly less equitable than we already have, which currently is a system which has a demonstrable satisfactory history of service. For that reason, I confirm the opposition's position to support the passage of the bill in the house and, as outlined before, to follow a process of referral to SARC.

I conclude by saying that that process, given its urgent attention, can occur and also enables SARC to conduct that inquiry well in advance of the time frames that industry has put to government—the six months, etc. that I have referred to—before commencement on 1 July 2016. If, for any reason, it does not, and it needs to start on 1 January 2017, or it does not start at all as a result of the investigations of SARC, then so be it. We need that statutory authority committee in the parliament to properly scrutinise what is presented before us because of the demonstrable failure of this government on its previous models.

Mr KNOLL (Schubert) (12:41): I rise to also support the bill, but in doing so, tease out some of the issues with the MAC privatisation process more generally. There has been quite a debate in this place and in the media about the motives behind the privatisation of the Motor Accident Commission, and especially from a Labor Party that has consistently opposed choice and competition in a whole host of areas. It seems that they are fervent converts to the benefits of a free-market system when it comes to the Motor Accident Commission. The cynic in me suggests that it could be because they need to prop up a failing budget.

One need only look at the estimated result for 2014-15 to see that the government got a handy $459 million dividend from the Motor Accident Commission this year, with further capital monies also being put back into the budget, and it seems to me that this may be the primary purpose behind their drive to privatise the Motor Accident Commission. Funnily enough, without this $459 million the budget bottom line would have looked a lot worse in this last financial year; it would have been absolutely horrendous.

The fact that we have to sell off the furniture in order to try and prop up the budget is a disgrace, especially when $459 million did not get us anywhere near a surplus—it did not get us anywhere near a surplus, and that is an absolute shame and an absolute disgrace, and it shows that these one-off hits to the budget bottom line are not going to do anything to change the structure of the deficit situation in South Australia; it is going to do nothing to change the productive infrastructure in South Australia going forward; and it is going to do nothing to help advance our economy.

All this dividend payment has done is to reduce our deficit figure by $459 million and then, correspondingly, delay the peak debt that the Labor Party in their budget papers at $13.2 billion has given us. So, it really is a cynical move, and the Treasurer comes into this house and talks about his stance as being pro-competition, that somehow the Labor Party is the driver and the keeper of the free-market flame, but can I say that that is quite disingenuous and quite frustrating to hear. The Liberal Party has, at its foundation, a support to choice, to freedom and to competition within as many sectors as we can within our economy. That is something that we proudly stand by, and today we proudly uphold that tradition.

I would like to highlight some examples where the Labor Party, if they were looking for some internal consistent philosophy, may see some flaws in some of their current policy, and maybe even some contradictions in their current proposition. The Treasurer comes into this place and says, 'We are here because we want to help to drive prices down by exposing CTP insurance to the private market.' That statement is a little hard to argue with, and I will go into that a bit more later on, but to be able to say that statement at the same time as quarantining 90 per cent of training places for the public provider does not make sense. The fact that you can say, 'We are here for the free market and we are here for competition when it comes to CTP, but we are not here for competition and we are not here for freedom of choice when it comes to private training providers' shows the hypocrisy of this government.

The idea is, somehow, CTP should be exposed to the bastions of the harsh free world but, on the other hand, private training providers, who have put decades of experience and their own capital behind private businesses, who are subject to the same regulatory requirements as the public provider, who have arguably higher completion rates than the public provider, and who are able to do so at 40 per cent of the cost of the public provider, yet this is not an area of the economy that we should expose to the competition. That 90 per cent of places going forward should be quarantined for TAFE shows the absolute hypocrisy of this government. So, for them to come in here and claim that they have some sort of mantle is an absolute joke, and it is one that we will continue to call them out on.

I also look at choice when it comes to the transport systems within South Australia. If our economy will be freed up by providing choice to CTP, why aren't we looking to provide choice when it comes to the introduction of novel and different transport systems, such as ride sharing? Why is it, after this idea being proposed, being around for a long time and being successfully implemented throughout the world, that South Australia needs to drag its feet? What is so different about the provision of taxi services to the CTP market? Again, this is rank hypocrisy from a government who pretends that it is somehow anything other than a protectionist government.

I look a little bit further to the basic democratic principles, and the differences between those principles in the Liberal and Labor parties. I stand here as a member of parliament who went through a gruelling preselection process, where every single member of the party in my electorate got to vote on my preselection. It was a very raw and brutal process, but it is one that I am proud of, because it is fundamentally democratic. We genuinely believe in choice and we give that choice to our broader membership.

Let us contrast that with those opposite, and the ability of their executive to be able to simply anoint and appoint people to various positions, or to do deals behind closed doors to ensure that the right people who have paid their dues and have towed the factional line are able to get up. To come into this place and suggest that it is okay to have choice when it comes to CTP while their fundamental party structure does not allow for freedom of choice shows the rank hypocrisy of the Labor Part on this issue.

I look at things like voluntary student unionism within universities—again, rank hypocrisy; so too when it comes to private health insurance. There is a whole host of areas where the Labor Party more broadly does not support the principles that it is trying to support here now. We on this side do have a level of scepticism about the privatisation of the Motor Accident Commission, and, I think, with good reason.

The first of those reasons is the fact that we have got a three-year transition period where there will be fixed increases in relation to which each of the three to five successful tenderers will be allowed to increase their premiums by. It is interesting that that three-year period takes us just beyond the next election, because heaven forbid—the Labor Party would not like for their new CTP system to be subject to the full rigours of the free market, just in case what they hope happens does not actually happen and we see CTP prices rise for average South Australians and the argument they have been running—that this is not about propping up a budget; this is about providing a better compulsory third-party insurance scheme—will be found out as a lie.

We on this side of the house would hope for nothing more than for this system to work. We are the party that understands freedom of choice and how competition can be a great thing to provide better quality outcomes for consumers at a lower cost. We have seen it in a whole host of areas across our economy, but the reason we have scepticism is that this is not necessarily completely free competition.

What we are setting up is, in a sense, a regulated oligopoly. It is not a case where anybody who wants to come in and provide CTP can do so. There is request for tender. The assumption is that between three and five providers will be chosen and those providers will then be linked into the government's database and be given a nominal market share to begin with, so they can begin the operation of this scheme.

But a regulated oligopoly does not always provide the benefits of free market competition and this is where our scepticism comes from. It is not as though we are talking pure competition where any business is able to come in and set up and do what they want, where you will see providers offering different styles of service and different product varieties to be able to meet the needs of consumers. What we have is something that will be regulated by statute and will, of necessity, be regulated by the government. That does not necessarily give the outcomes that the free market would otherwise give.

I am not suggesting that this is an area that should be completely open to free-market competition, but this is what gives us our scepticism when it comes to looking at this issue and it is something that those opposite should be mindful of. The reason we know that they also have some reluctance and some worry about this is that otherwise they would not have put that three-year transitional arrangement in place.

If they were confident that prices were going to come down as a result of this change, then they would allow the market to do what it does in this regulated environment from day one. The reason they have put in a three-year transition arrangement is that they are not sure and they want to see how this thing works, but also because they want to make sure that if things go badly that happens beyond March 2018 and not beforehand. That is why we have shown scepticism on this issue.

I would like to reiterate that we are the party of choice; we are the party of competition; we are the party of the free market. We have shown consistently over decades that we have a commitment to this principle. The Labor Party, conversely, have been late converts and partial converts and, certainly, selective converts to this principle and we have seen that in other policy areas where maybe they need to prop up friends they need to look after and not expose to the harsh realities of the real world.

With that, I will indicate my and our support for this bill, but put on notice the fact that we will be watching to see what happens and what are the outcomes of this change, and we will be holding the government to account for the promises they have made to the South Australian people to ensure that we do get a system that helps to be lowest cost for consumers in South Australia.

Ms REDMOND (Heysen) (12:53): I rise to indicate that, whilst I agree with many of the comments made by the member for Schubert, I will be opposing this bill as I have opposed every change that the government has sought to make to the CTP scheme. What they have done is utterly disgraceful. This scheme worked well and would have continued to work well for the benefit of the people of this state and it has been dismantled for no better reason than their financial incompetence.

I will just place on the record what has gone on here. Firstly, a couple of years ago, the government decided that they would remove from the fund—held, basically, in trust by the CTP managers (the Motor Accident Commission)—a sum of $100 million. That, as the member for Schubert rightly indicated, was nothing more than simply propping up their budget and trying to make good on their own financial misdemeanours.

Then I think they saw that there was a potential to take even more money because this system was operating so successfully that the Motor Accident Commission—very good board, very highly regarded people who contribute their time to manage this fund—had accumulated quite a bit of money. So the government decided that they would close down the system so that they could basically remove the money. Now of course they cannot simply come in and close down the system and take all the money, so after having taken $100 million a couple of years ago for their budget, they decided to then introduce legislation which would dramatically decrease the amount of compensation to which people in this state would be entitled in the event that they had a motor vehicle accident.

The reality is that everyone in this state who registered and insured their car would be aware that, in fact, the insurance premium that they paid was a relatively small part of the actual registration fee because most of the fee actually went to create this fund which, as I say, was being well managed by the Motor Accident Commission. The fund, being well managed, was more than capable of accommodating all the people who were injured in motor vehicle accidents in this state, including the very few each year who would have what were called 'catastrophic injuries'.

In deciding to reduce the entitlements of people under this legislation, the government said, 'We are going to introduce this new system of lifetime support.' The reality was that the system as it operated already provided lifetime support for people who were catastrophically injured in motor vehicle accidents, and I know this because I actually ran some of the biggest cases in this state when I was in practice.

The system was more than adequate to cope with that and I venture to suggest that, even if they had decided to extend the system for the few people who might be catastrophically injured in non-motor vehicle accidents, those people who are absolutely catastrophically injured, who have no prospects to do anything except have a long time of debilitating injury and its consequences throughout their life and who are going to take a lot of money to look after—even those extras, who are not motor accident vehicle people—would have been able to have been compensated within that scheme and we could have added them in.

Instead, the government decides to reduce the amount of compensation payable to the vast majority of people, and the reason for it is not to provide lifetime support—as I say that was already available. The reason for it was so that they could minimise what is called the 'long tail', so they could minimise the amount of money that was going to have to be paid out for claims into the future. Why did they want to do that? They wanted to do that so that the rest of the money in that pot that the Motor Accident Commission manages could be taken by the government to prop up its budget.

That is the whole purpose of what this government has done. It is all about managing its own finances, and to do that what they are doing, in my view, is stealing from the people of this state because it is not government money; it is not even taxes that are being paid into the fund. This is a fund which was created out of the money people paid for their registration. It is money that belonged to the people and was being held, essentially, in trust. The government is minimising the amount that is left in the fund for those claims into the future so that they can maximise the amount they are going to have.

For those reasons, given the hour, I will close my remarks, but I make it very clear that I believe that the people of this state should be rising up in absolute anger and protest about what this government has done to a perfectly good operating system which was providing an excellent service and it is doing it for no better reason than that it wants to cover its own economic mismanagement.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. L.W.K. Bignell.

Sitting suspended from 13:00 to 14:00.