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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 4 Hansard (28 March) . . Page.. 992 ..

MR BERRY (continuing):

That is much fairer than the training companies bearing all of the responsibility, because very few of these trainees and apprentices and so on are injured with training companies. They are injured out on jobs where they are taken on as apprentices and trainees. I just throw that one in for the government to consider. I think that this, or a proposal along those lines, is something that is worth looking at.

I want to return now to the issue of the maximum rate of 15 per cent. I think I said earlier, that it is a fairly blunt instrument and it is not very sophisticated. But I do not think anybody should apologise for that, because there needs to be something to focus the minds of people on dealing with an issue which is affecting training companies out there in the community. I have consulted with people fairly widely on this. I have had the insurance companies come to me, and they do not like it. I am not surprised they do not like it.

There is good reason for discomfort about the issue, because it is an intervention by government into the marketplace, and I can understand why the government will say, "We do not want to do that." I have some hesitation about that too. I think we all have, but we have to do something about this particular problem and the government has to come up with an answer to deal with it. We will be offering this 15 per cent as a solution, but that should not prevent the government coming up with flexible options to deal with the issue in some other way.

I do not want to speak for Mr Osborne, as I am sure he can speak for himself, but I think that everybody here would be prepared to listen to anything which deals with the issue. It is the issue, not the brand name that is on the solution, which is at stake here. We have to find some way of dealing with it.

What I propose to do is circulate an amendment, which I have not done yet because I have been considering the form it should take. I will do it as soon as I sit down. My amendment stipulates that, if the government adopts a maximum rate approach to the workers compensation premium, there must be a sunset clause on it, so that we revisit it. I want to make sure that the next Assembly revisits this issue, and we do not let it slide off the agenda.

I think we have a chance to consider the performance of the workers compensation system in the ACT against the background of information we should have collected with the system that has been put in place by the government to collect information about workers compensation. I understand there are some problems with the database as we speak. I do not think it is completely operational at this stage, but a lot of work has been put into it, as I understand it. I hope to be able to question the minister more on that some time later.

What I propose to do is to amend this motion to ensure that, if the maximum rate approach is taken, there is a sunset clause to ensure that we revisit the issue at some time in the future. I think that is extremely important. Leaving aside the politics of the place, we, as a group of legislators in this place, have an obligation to look to our future, and our future is in education and training, there is no question about that.

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