Common Law changes.

Workcover Victims Victoria
17th June 2009.

Slater & Gordon estimate up to 5,000 people could make a claim if all common
law rights were restored during the black hole.

At an average claim of $200,000 each, that would add up to a billion dollars.

The question for government, employers and insurers is whether this excluded
group of people should be entitled to the same access to compensation as those
injured before and after them?

Mr Bracks said in a press release he made Tuesday, April 11, 2000, that
WorkCover would be fully funded by his labour government and it seems that
in actual fact it wasn’t. It was still going to take 3 years.

In Mr Bracks accident compensation act changes made to commence on the
20th October 1999 he excluded 5000 injured workers from making any
common law claims for their injuries without an explanation as to why?

Yet he was trumpeting off about the fact that the Labor Government was elected
with a very clear commitment to restore common law rights for seriously injured
workers and we said we wanted a WorkCover scheme which was fully funded,
and restored the common law rights of seriously injured workers.

Mr Bracks said workers would be able to access damages for common law if
they satisfied strict guidelines for serious injury under either a whole person
impairment test or through a tightened narrative which would be accessed
through the courts, but he neglected to say that 5000 of us would be excluded.

So he didn’t restore our common law rights at all he amended them to cost
him less money.

Mr Bracks also said that WorkCover premiums would rise slightly to 2.18 % of
payroll and that this will overcome WorkCover’s unfunded liability, which has
been estimated at $296 million, and ensure the scheme is fully funded within
three years. So if this was actual fact then why did he exclude 5000 injured
workers from their common law right to natural justice if WorkCover would
be fully funded within three years?

Why didn’t he include us all?

Mr Bracks also said workers who were seriously injured between November
1997 and October 1999 would be offered assistance through a new Intensive
Case Review Program (ICRP) Mr Bracks said, “The ICRP will offer support to
the victims who were hardest hit by the Kennett Government’s changes.

The program will ensure that seriously injured workers are getting the maximum
financial help they can include the chance, where appropriate, to access a lump
sum settlement of their benefit,” Mr Bracks said.

WCV’s ran a poll on this ICRP issue and surprise, surprise none of my Injured
Workers have been offered the ICRP or knew about it, so from what I can
see this program never happened.

In his Media Release for the Office of the Minister for Workcover dated
Tuesday, March 7, 2000 Mr Cameron states the changes were responsible
and affordable.

He said “These changes show that this government cares for those workers
who are severely injured in the workplace and Now under Labor, Victorians
who are seriously injured at work because of employer or third party
negligence will have the right to take action through the courts but he also
neglected to tell us that 5000 of us would miss out!

Mr Cameron also stated that the abolition of Common Law was a blunt
instrument which was used by the previous government in an attempt to
reduce costs in the WorkCover Authority,” Yet he has done nothing about it
either.

He goes on to say that “Far from improving the financial stability of the scheme,
the removal of common law rights has instead, lead to an increase in the number
of active long term claimants.”

"Rather than reform the claims management process of the VWA the previous
government instead chose to abolish common law - stealing the rights of seriously
injured workers. The right of seriously injured workers to sue negligent
employers is a historic right that should never have been removed.”

Mr Cameron also said “The mismanagement of the previous government has
resulted in a budget-black hole of almost $300 million, but we now know that
if the legislation was fully reverted it was estimated to be at least 1 billion if all
injured workers were included.

So my question is simple, if these two Government Ministers knew what
effects removing our common law rights would and did have, then why
haven’t they worked to ensure we were all included and treated equally?

After all it has been 9 years, Its not like they havent had time?

This is nothing but pure discrimination of any injured worker hurt during the
Kennett years and I for one am very surprised that this issue has not been
tested in our courts.

Let me know your thoughts?