John Key gave New Zealanders a pledge he would not privatise state assets during his first term of Government. He also pledged he would investigate only opening up the ACC Work Account.
Just a year down the track, those promises are in tatters. National is now investigating privatising all ACC accounts and Nick Smith says privatisation will be enacted as soon as the investigations are completed in June.
The Government is attempting to justify these broken promises by manufacturing a crisis. It claims ACC is insolvent when it has over $11 billion dollars of reserves and last year collected $1 billion more in levies than it spent on claims.
There is no justification for New Zealand's world-leading publicly-owned ACC scheme being sold off to private companies. Labour will fight privatisation from which big Aussie insurance companies will make 100s of millions of dollars in profits but Kiwis will as a result be forced to pay more to get less.
Rodney Hide's plan to privatise water infrastructure now run by councils raises further serious questions. New Zealanders oppose the privatisation of water because, just like ACC, they recognise they will end up paying more for this vital service.
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