Official Information Act request - Medico-legal and such like reports for ACC review purposes
Lee M. made this Official Information request to Minister for ACC
This request has an unknown status. We're waiting for Lee M. to read a recent response and update the status.
From: Lee M.
Dear Minister for ACC,
The ACC has 'deep pockets' of funds available to it in terms of its
spending power when it comes to medico-legal and such like reports
for ACC decision review purposes. By comparison, the ACC claimants are more
often than not living virtually hand to mouth on income support
paid by ACC or WINZ, or receive no income at all and are wholly
reliant on their partners/husbands/wives.
Schedule 1 of the Scale of costs and expenses on review under the
Injury Prevention, Rehabilitation, and Compensation (Review Costs
and Appeals) Regulations was last revised in 2002. It is now 14
years later and ACC claimants are really struggling to meet the
high prices being quoted by the handful of specialists who are
willing, suitably qualified and competent to produce specialised
medico-legal reports for ACC review purposes, as and when requested
by ACC claimants who are preparing to come up against the ACC and
its well funded specialists who are seemingly willing to say
anything the ACC wants to hear as long as the price is right. (An
example is that an occupational medico-legal report ordered by a
claimant recently cost $2,710.00 while a "file review opinion"
ordered by the same claimant has recently been quoted at $1,800.00
--- when this claimant is without an income and has been for more
than 5 years since suffering the injuries that are the subject of
the aforementioned reports, and the maximum claimable under the
current regulations is $935.54).
So the following Official Information Act requests arise;
1) does the ACC not realise that time has moved on, and that
claimants and their very real, and significantly increased, costs
and expenses have been left behind (while the ACC by comparison has
simply increased the amounts it is willing to pay specialists to
produce reports that it orders)?
2) when is the ACC going to increase the Schedule 1 of the Scale of
costs and expenses to meet the high prices now being quoted to
claimants as abovementioned?
3) how is an ACC claimant to achieve fairness and justice when
medico-legal reports now exceed affordability for the vast majority
of ACC claimants?
4) is it not time that the ACC stopped spending ACC levy funds -
collected through a wide range of mechanisms - on outlandishly
expensive medico-legal reports that claimants simply cannot match,
and which produce an uneven playing field that is heavily weighted
towards the ACC?
Yours faithfully,
Lee M.
From: N Kaye
Minister for ACC
Thank you for contacting the office of Hon Nikki Kaye. The Minister
receives a high volume of correspondence and will respond to you as soon
as possible.
Thank you once again for your message,
Kind regards,
Office of Hon Nikki Kaye
T: 04 817 6837
[1][Minister for ACC request email]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
References
Visible links
1. mailto:[Minister for ACC request email]
From: John Roseveare
Minister for ACC
Good afternoon
On behalf of Hon Nikki Kaye, Minister for ACC, thank you for your message of 18 April 2016 below.
The Minister will consider and respond to the questions you have asked as soon as possible.
John Roseveare
Private Secretary to the Minister for ACC
[email address]
Private Bag 18041 | Wellington 6160
-----Original Message-----
From: Lee M. [mailto:[FOI #3908 email]]
Sent: Monday, 18 April 2016 8:30 p.m.
To: N Kaye
Subject: Official Information Act request - Official Information Act request - Medico-legal and such like reports for ACC review purposes
Dear Minister for ACC,
The ACC has 'deep pockets' of funds available to it in terms of its spending power when it comes to medico-legal and such like reports for ACC decision review purposes. By comparison, the ACC claimants are more often than not living virtually hand to mouth on income support paid by ACC or WINZ, or receive no income at all and are wholly reliant on their partners/husbands/wives.
Schedule 1 of the Scale of costs and expenses on review under the Injury Prevention, Rehabilitation, and Compensation (Review Costs and Appeals) Regulations was last revised in 2002. It is now 14 years later and ACC claimants are really struggling to meet the high prices being quoted by the handful of specialists who are willing, suitably qualified and competent to produce specialised medico-legal reports for ACC review purposes, as and when requested by ACC claimants who are preparing to come up against the ACC and its well funded specialists who are seemingly willing to say anything the ACC wants to hear as long as the price is right. (An example is that an occupational medico-legal report ordered by a claimant recently cost $2,710.00 while a "file review opinion"
ordered by the same claimant has recently been quoted at $1,800.00
--- when this claimant is without an income and has been for more than 5 years since suffering the injuries that are the subject of the aforementioned reports, and the maximum claimable under the current regulations is $935.54).
So the following Official Information Act requests arise;
1) does the ACC not realise that time has moved on, and that claimants and their very real, and significantly increased, costs and expenses have been left behind (while the ACC by comparison has simply increased the amounts it is willing to pay specialists to produce reports that it orders)?
2) when is the ACC going to increase the Schedule 1 of the Scale of costs and expenses to meet the high prices now being quoted to claimants as abovementioned?
3) how is an ACC claimant to achieve fairness and justice when medico-legal reports now exceed affordability for the vast majority of ACC claimants?
4) is it not time that the ACC stopped spending ACC levy funds - collected through a wide range of mechanisms - on outlandishly expensive medico-legal reports that claimants simply cannot match, and which produce an uneven playing field that is heavily weighted towards the ACC?
Yours faithfully,
Lee M.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
This is an OIA request done via the FYI website.
Please do not send progress updates as PDF files.
Disclaimer: This message and any reply that you make will be published on the internet. Our privacy and copyright policies:
https://fyi.org.nz/help/officers
If you find this service useful as an OIA officer, please ask your web manager to link to us from your organisation's OIA page.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
________________________________
hide quoted sections
From: John Roseveare
Minister for ACC
Good afternoon
Please find attached a response from Hon Nikki Kaye, Minister for ACC, to
your email of 18 April 2016.
John Roseveare
Private Secretary to the Minister for ACC
[1][email address]
Private Bag 18041 | Wellington 6160
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
References
Visible links
1. mailto:[email address]
From: Lee M.
Dear John Roseveare,
Here we go ahead. Another "independent" review that will produce another report that will no doubt tell the ACC what it wants to hear and not the truth of what is causing so many claimants so much grief.
When are you going to involve claimants in the process I wonder? What good is it investigating the faults of a system that the report writer does not use and has not experienced? And if she has, no doubt she got star treatment from the ACC because of her QC credentials.
Yet another waste of taxpayers money and another pile of papers to be added to the large number of reports commissioned by the ACC and Minister for ACC over the years that has changed nothing.
I can assure you that once I am done with my claims and gone through the District Court and High Court processes, that I will be lobbying hard and long for meaningful change to this very broken, if not corrupt, system.
Yours sincerely,
Lee M.
From: Lee M.
Dear Minister for ACC,
I refer to the reply letter dated 11 May 2016 posted above.
I also refer to the written and signed authority provided by my wife and copied to the ACC and its lawyers that empowers me to communicate with both aforementioned bodies on her behalf.
As an adjunct to my wife's original information request and your reply abovementioned, I am requesting that you post a copy hereat of Miriam Dean QC's report that you expected to receive in early June 2016.
Yours faithfully,
Husband of Lee M.
From: N Kaye
Minister for ACC
Thank you for contacting the office of Hon Nikki Kaye. The Minister
receives a high volume of correspondence and will respond to you as soon
as possible.
Thank you once again for your message,
Kind regards,
Office of Hon Nikki Kaye
T: 04 817 6837
[1][Minister for ACC request email]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
References
Visible links
1. mailto:[Minister for ACC request email]
Things to do with this request
- Add an annotation (to help the requester or others)
- Download a zip file of all correspondence
Offensive? Unsuitable?
Requests for personal information and vexatious requests are not considered valid requests for Official Information (read more).
If you believe this request is not suitable, you can report it for attention by the site administrators
Report this requestAct on what you've learnt
Similar requests
Delegation of services to Fairway Resolution Limited by the ACC under the AC Act
To Minister for ACC by Lee M.
Why does the ACC's Office of Complaints Investigator refuse to investigate?
To Minister for ACC by Lee M.
