Unions oppose ACC levy dip

By KEVIN TAYLOR

ACC is proposing reducing employer levies, sparking a claim that workers are subsidising employers.

It proposes cutting the average employer levy from $1.20 per $100 of payroll to $1.12 for the 2003-04 year.

Council of Trade Unions president Ross Wilson, a former ACC deputy chairman, said yesterday that workers were subsidising employers, breaching international law.

He said it was disappointing ACC had failed to recommend reversing the National Government's 1990 decision to introduce co-payments.

International Labour Organisation convention 17 required New Zealand to ensure all workers injured in work accidents got free medical care.

But Wilson said ACC consultation papers revealed that injured people in New Zealand were paying $330 million in treatment costs which should be paid by ACC, and employers alone were getting an annual $39 million subsidy.

He said the CTU would support a Government commitment to fixing the inequity.

Accident Insurance Minister Ruth Dyson would not comment because consultation on proposed levies was still going on.

Business NZ executive director Anne Knowles said ILO convention 17 dated from the 1930s and the current ACC scheme went well beyond anything envisaged then.

Knowles said she had expected the employer levy to drop. It includes a residual claims levy - proposed to fall from 35c to 30c.

The residual levy pays for the ACC "tail" - the cost of unfunded claims as at July 1, 1999, when workplace insurance was privatised.

ACC also proposes cutting average self-employed levies from $3.17 to $3.09.