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Question and Answer Tracking Details

80 - Finance and Small Business - ICARE INJURED WORKER PAYMENTS

Mookhey, Daniel to the Minister for Finance and Small Business

I ask a supplementary question. Will the Minister elucidate that part of his answer where he refers to the 53,000 workers. What proportion of them are covered by the Treasury Managed Fund and thus work in the public sector?
Original Answer -

The Hon. DAMIEN TUDEHOPE (Minister for Finance and Small Business) (12:55:03): To the extent that this calls for additional information about the break‑up of the compensation package and how it is being distributed, clearly I do not have those significant details. In fact, we can come in here and play these games—

The Hon. John Graham: Which is okay.

The Hon. DAMIEN TUDEHOPE: It is okay.

The Hon. Penny Sharpe: We ask you questions and you either know the answer or you do not.

The Hon. DAMIEN TUDEHOPE: Correct.

The Hon. Bronnie Taylor: Point of order: I draw the attention of the House to the fact that questions are asked and then answered. For members to hear the answer, they need to listen. The constant interjections from those opposite cause confusion because it is very difficult for members to hear the answer. I ask that the members be called to order so that the House can hear the Minister answer the question.

The PRESIDENT: The Minister has the call. I encourage the Minister to be directly relevant and not to debate or perambulate around the question. If the Minister does not have the answer, he can take the question on notice.

The Hon. DAMIEN TUDEHOPE: I thank you, Mr President, for your guidance. To the extent that the question calls for me to provide a break‑up of the 53,000 workers who are receiving part of this compensation package, I will endeavour to provide that information to the shadow Treasurer in due course.
Additional Answer -

I  am advised that the 53,000 injured workers to receive a total of $38 million from icare as a proactive payment to remediate historical errors in the calculation of pre-injury average weekly earnings (PIAWE) are all covered by the Nominal Insurer, so none of them are workers covered by the Treasury Managed Fund.

At this stage, icare does not have sufficient data to support a similar proactive payment approach for the non-exempt injured workers covered by the Treasury Managed Fund, From the preliminary reviews carried out to date the percentage of identified underpayments from the Treasury Managed Fund is 0.4%. As more claims are assessed and analysed by icare this percentage may change. icare will provide more information for Treasury Managed Fund workers as it comes to hand.

Police officers, paramedics and fire fighters are exempt from the operation of the 2012 and 2015 amendments to the Workers Compensation Act 1987 so that PIAWE does not apply to these employees if they are injured at work. As PIAWE does not apply they cannot been impacted by errors in PIAWE calculations and so are not part of the remediation program as they are not impacted by a PIAWE calculation. 


Question asked on 11 November 2021 (session 57-1)
Answer received on 16 November 2021

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