Open letter to the CEO of the Accident Compensation Corporation
Dear Mr. Pickering,
You will recall that for the last two years I have tried to correct the critical flaw in the Accident Compensation Scheme. I informed you that the levy / entitlement process for self-employed PAYE schedular taxpayers had not been implemented.
You chose to stone wall and ignore me. I warned you that the Corporation was facing a legal and political apocalypse unprecedented in New Zealand agency history. I note the Corporation has selected one of the most experienced and qualified lawyers in NZ to face me.
I have a lawyer of my own as it happens if I so require but most importantly, I have Section 221 (2) and Schedule 4 C 22. For many years now ACC lawyers have enjoyed twisting the meanings contained in the Accident Compensation Act to suit their purpose which of course is to decline entitlement, essentially preying on vulnerable and injured lay people who have no idea how to respond.
Thing is Mr. Pickering we are dealing with a prescribed levy process that is not open to judicial interpretation and means exactly what the words contained in the legislation mean. The consideration is totally objective. So, there are no fancy constructs to be advanced, no distortions of the English language allowed.
In short, the apocalypse I promised you is here. I thought I would assist you to process this new reality. As the CEO of a multi billion-dollar state agency you are required to explain the following to the public of New Zealand how it has come to pass that:
ACC has failed to levy and compensate self-employed PAYE schedular taxpayers since the 1st of April 2008 which amounts to 11 years of failing to implement the will of Parliament.
ACC has failed to respond to the matters I have raised for two years.
ACC has been producing wildly varying accounting decisions on self-employed claims.
ACC has been unilaterally altering the earnings status of self-employed schedular payments in the absence of legislation.
ACC has been producing decisions that sit outside of the laws of accounting and mathematics bringing into serious question the competency of ACC accounting.
Having altered the status of those earnings ACC declines to compensate those earnings and then goes on to levy those earnings unlawfully under Section 222 in the following financial year.
When the claimant cannot pay because they have not been able to work and been unlawfully denied their compensation, ACC calls in debt collectors to pursue a debt the claimant has not legally incurred. Credit ratings will have been affected.
ACC has wasted potentially millions on paper invoices sent out unlawfully under Section 222 when those levies should have been automatically collected by IRD along with the required tax payment.
Potentially 100’s of millions of dollars has been taken unlawfully out of the economy resulting in the loss of all the GST the government would have collected.
Other government agencies such as WINZ will have had to pay struggling injured people out of their own budgets.
Injured people will have lost their homes, relationships, sanity and general quality of life.
ACC will have to spend millions backtracking through every self-employed earner since 2008 in the absence of any auditing process.
Every day this goes on ACC is amassing penalty interest payments.
The scheme has been broken at a core level for 11 years. Public confidence in ACC and IRD will hit rock bottom.
ACC legal has failed to address this issue preferring instead to try and make constructs to subvert prescribed legislation.
ACC has failed the government which clearly placed its faith in the wrong party. This makes the government look rather stupid.
So, there we have it Mr. Pickering. All these things I deliver to you. The buck stops with you after all. The reason why I call my business Cassandra is because when people do not listen to me the outcome is generally grim. I told you and you did not listen. I told the Prime Minister and she did not listen.
The actions of the Corporation will push the needle over the line from total incompetence to corruption in the minds of many. If you had of responded from the outset you could have passed the blame to IRD and the Prime Minister could have passed it to the National party.
But you did not and so all this now firmly belongs to the Corporation from the board down and the current Labour led government. The cost in human misery is incalculable and it is you Mr. Pickering and your mealy-mouthed minions who own that.
I hope I have been helpful in presenting your position to you.