NFD Astonished At ACC $2b Surplus

The National Foundation for the Deaf is astonished ACC is on track to post a $2 billion surplus while it is slashing services to people with work-related sound-damaged hearing.

News of the projected surplus emerged from an ACC newsletter updating the state of the corporation’s operations.

“It is astonishing ACC is boasting it’s on track for a $2b surplus this year while those with industrial sound-damaged hearing cannot get the hearing aids they desperately need,” NFD CEO Louise Carroll said today.

“These people are victims of socially unjust ACC policies.”

Mrs Carroll said those policies included a raft of measures that will limit people’s access to the rehabilitation they were actually entitled to.

“ACC Minister Nick Smith says the corporation is trying to improve ACC’s performance, but at the coalface the reality is that people with hearing injuries are having to fight for support and meet thresholds we regard as unreasonable.”

Mrs Carroll said ACC based its changes to hearing injury cover on the assertion it could not afford to keep funding rehabilitation at the current rate.

“The fact ACC is on track for a $2b surplus this year, and their chairman is suggesting the target for full funding may be met two years early gives the lie to these claims,” she said.

“We believe ACC’s projections for future increases in claim numbers are wrong, and the latest ACC figures suggest claims are levelling out and perhaps falling. We also believe the basis for part-charges are based on the erroneous application of the science.

“The victims of this are people who have the right to expect they will get the rehabilitation and the support they need.

“For ACC to now be posting surpluses of this magnitude shows its affordability argument does not stack up.”

ENDS

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