LYNNE PILLAY (Labour) to the Minister for ACC: Does he agree ACC should tighten procedures to limit access to counselling for those injured through serious crime?
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister for ACC) : The Government is not making any changes to the accident compensation legislation in respect of when people get counselling for sensitive claims arising from crime. The issue here is best practice. A substantive research project initiated and concluded during the last Government by Massey University recommended new guidelines to ensure better service for clients. The Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) is implementing those changes, and I am very reluctant to interfere in decisions on clinical best practice in this area, or, frankly, any other.
Lynne Pillay: Why, then, did two young boys from Taranaki, who were sodomised and thrown out of a window, and whose case for counselling was supported by their counsellor and the police, have to resort to their stories being told in the media because ACC had declined the counselling they so clearly needed, in order to have someone from the Government listen?
Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The member for New Plymouth raised that specific and sensitive case with me—
Hon Annette King: Belatedly.
Hon Dr NICK SMITH: —actually, before the Opposition did, and raised it publicly. I have asked ACC officials to look into the specifics of the case. I ask the member and others in the House not to substitute themselves for clinical psychologists who appropriately make the judgment of whether people are eligible for accident compensation, and judge the appropriateness of the particular counselling or other care that is provided.
Lynne Pillay: Does this Taranaki example show that victims of horrendous sexual crimes now have to tell their terrible and personal stories publicly in order for them to get the help they need, and will he now guarantee that ACC will fund the counselling?
Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I think it is important for the House to note that there has been no change in the clinical guidelines, to date.
Hon Annette King: Oh yes, there has.
Hon Dr NICK SMITH: No, there has not. I have just answered a large number of written questions on this matter, and the answers show that the number of cases that have been turned down in recent months is no different from what it was a year ago—no different, according to those statistics. So I say to the member opposite that this case, tragic as it is, cannot be a consequence of any changes in practice, because those changes have not yet been made.
Sandra Goudie: Has the Minister or his associate Minister at any time since his appointment asked ACC to make savings in the area of counselling?
Hon Dr NICK SMITH: No, I have not. The changes regarding counselling for sensitive claims were well under way before my appointment. My only direction to ACC is to be cautious in this sensitive area, because I do recognise how vulnerable victims of sexual abuse are.
I seek leave of the House to table Sexual Abuse and Mental Injury: Practice Guidelines for Aotearoa New Zealand, dated March 2008.
Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that document. [Interruption] Order! The seeking of leave is being dealt with. Members need only reflect on who was interjecting while that was happening. Leave is sought. Is there any objection to that course of action? There is no objection.
* Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.
Lynne Pillay: Why has the Minister claimed that decisions to limit counselling are clinical decisions, when the decision to cancel and decline counselling for people who have been raped and molested is being made by people in Wellington who have never met, or even spoken with, these victims and who are simply rubber-stamping cost-cutting initiatives being put in place by this Government?
Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The first thing I would point out, for the member, is that in the example she has given, and arising from the representations that have been made by the member for New Plymouth, Child, Youth and Family has appropriately decided to fund counselling for the boys who are affected. In respect of the member’s claims that people in Wellington are making decisions about such counselling, I assure the member that those decisions are being made by properly qualified psychiatrists and others who have the clinical skills to make them.
Hon David Parker: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Given that the Government does not have numbers for the reduction in scope—
Mr SPEAKER: I am listening for the point of order and there is nothing—
Hon David Parker: I seek leave to table—
Mr SPEAKER: I am on my feet. There is nothing that I can perceive to do with the order of the House that has anything to do with Government numbers for anything. I ask the member to come to his point of order.
Hon David Parker: I seek leave for my member’s bill, the Injury Prevention, Rehabilitation and Compensation (Change of Date for Full Funding) Amendment Bill, which extends by 5 years the deadline for funding of the accident compensation tail, to be put on the Order Paper.
Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought for that member’s bill to be put on the Order Paper. Is there any objection to that course of action? There is objection.
Hon Lianne Dalziel: I seek leave to table the document that ACC prepared showing its new guidelines for victims of sexual violence, which do not bear resemblance—
Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table a further ACC document on guidelines. Is there any objection to that course of action? There is objection.
Hon Trevor Mallard: In light of the Minister’s reply to the last supplementary question—that Child, Youth and Family is funding counselling for young boys—what is the system now for counselling older, female rape victims?
Hon Dr NICK SMITH: A member asked a specific question about a case in New Plymouth that had been drawn to my attention by the member for New Plymouth, and I appropriately drew to the House’s attention the fact that counselling has been provided by Child, Youth and Family. In respect of ACC’s support for victims of sexual abuse, ACC will continue to provide support as per the clinical guidelines that were developed during the time of the previous Government, of which that member was part—and they were launched by the Hon Steve Maharey, I would note.
http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/PB/Debates/Debates/1/e/d/49HansD_20091015_00000029-Questions-for-Oral-Answer-Questions-to-Ministers.htm
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