Compensation Act provides for special payment

Taupo Times, Volume 23, Issue 46, 11 June 1974, Page 7

Compensation Act provides for special payment

No doubt cases could be presented where a person would appear to receive less immediate financial benefits under accident compensation than under the former damages system, but there was one ultimate answer to every criticism, said the chairman of the Accident Compensation Commission, Mr K. L. Sandford. "This is that one can ultimately point to section 179A of the Accident Compensation Act, an extraordinary and overlooked section enabling the Accident Compensation Commission to make exgratia payments without limit," he said. Such payments could be made in appropriate circumstances to people who may not be even covered by the Act, or to whom the commission considered additional compensation should be awarded. "This is a most valuable provision to enable the commission to deal with what would otherwise be the hard and the hardship cases," said Mr Sandford.

"Because any such exgratia payments are to be met out of general taxation, it is not unreasonable that the Minister of Finance is required to add his approval to a proposed award." Mr Sandford- emphasised that the ex-gratia payment section was designed to apply only to special cases and that he was confident the accident compensation system provided better overall help for the accidentally injured than was available previously. There was a tendency for people to ignore the funds which the commission could employ in professional or job retraining and other forms of rehabilitation, quite apart from the commission's role in providing for a claimant's earnings loss throughout the whole of his or her working life. "Under accident compensation the concern will be not on whether or not the plaintiff gets his verdict and it so for how much, but what are his real needs from the moment of the

accident through to the end of his working life," he said. Concern for the injured man will not end, as it has done under the damages system, on the day of settlement or verdict, said Mr Sandford. "Whatever opinion is held concerning the comparison of benefits, surely the availability of compensation to all is an advance on a system whereby it was available to a limited nurnber," he said. "Twenty-four-hour protection for everyone in New Zealand, covering accidents at work, on the roads, at home, or in sport, providing earnings-related benefits for widows and other dependants; providing iong-term benefits for those Who suffer injury - while undertaking commendable voluntary social services, such as search and rescue, St John Ambulance, or volunteer firemen — all these considerations bear on any comparison of accident compensation benefits with common law damages."