NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookhey accuses Coalition of $1.9bn workers comp blowout

Business and industry leaders have turned on Liberal Leader Mark Speakman over the Coalition’s decision to block a controversial overhaul of workers compensation laws.

Business and industry leaders have turned on Liberal Leader Mark Speakman over the Coalition’s decision to block an overhaul of workers compensation laws.

Mr Speakman and Opposition Treasury spokesman Damien Tudehope are facing growing backlash from the Liberal party’s traditional support base for opposing legislation which would make it harder for workers to claim compensation payments for psychological injuries.

Treasurer Daniel Mookhey has previously said that without reform, businesses would face a 36 per cent hike in insurance premiums to prevent the compensation scheme collapsing.

His proposed reforms — which will be debated in parliament on Thursday — would increase the “impairment” threshold required for a person to claim lifetime compensation payments.

However, the Coalition unsuccessfully sided with the Greens on Tuesday night in an attempt to oppose that increase.

Following the vote, NSW Minerals Council CEO Stephen Galilee accused the Coalition of abandoning “responsible” policy in favour of scoring political points.

“By joining the Greens to oppose these reforms, the Opposition is sending a concerning message that it is more interested in playing parliamentary games than pursuing responsible economic policy,” he told The Daily Telegraph.

The Coalition wants to push the legislation to a parliamentary inquiry, which could take two months to report back.

ClubsNSW boss Rebecca Riant said that was unnecessary.

“The case for this workers compensation reform is clear and we do not need another inquiry,” she said.

“We encourage the NSW Parliament to seize this opportunity for bipartisan reform, creating a fair system for businesses and injured workers.”

NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookhey. Picture: NewsWire / Gaye Gerard

ClubsNSW was one of five peak industry groups who publicly called on parliament to pass the government’s workers compensation changes.

A number of business community sources on Wednesday night accused Mr Tudehope of opposing workers compensation reforms in order to prevent Mr Mookhey banking the savings measures in this month’s budget.

Earlier, Mr Speakman rejected suggestions he was aligning with unions against small businesses.

“We’re not in bed with anyone, we are doing our best as an opposition to hold this government to account,” he said.

“We will do everything we reasonably can expeditiously to drive premiums down, but we are not going to abandon the most seriously injured workers,” he said.

The Coalition will on Thursday attempt to move a number of amendments to the government’s legislation.

Those amendments, Treasurer Mookhey said, would add almost $2 billion worth of “financial pressure” to the compensation scheme over four years.

Mr Mookhey has argued that the workplace compensation insurance scheme is haemorrhaging money, and could collapse entirely without reform.

Business NSW CEO Daniel Hunter has previously said that the scheme is going $5 million further into deficit every day.

NSW Opposition leader Mark Speakman. Photo: NewsWire/ Gaye Gerard

The controversial workers compensation reforms will face a tough battle to pass the upper house of NSW parliament on Thursday, after the Greens and Coalition unsuccessfully tried to squash the bill in the lower house earlier this week.

Mr Mookhey accused Opposition leader Mark Speakman on Wednesday of holding up the legislation with amendments that would pile billions of financial pressure onto the scheme.

“It does nothing to improve the sustainability of the scheme, it does nothing to help people return to work and it does nothing to provide stability to the scheme,” Mr Mookhey said.

“The advice I received overnight is that the opposition’s amendments will add $1.9 billion of additional financial pressure to the scheme compared to the government’s reforms over a four-year period.

“This solution is not a solution – my worry is that the opposition is simply playing political games with the Greens party rather than seriously trying to reform this scheme … and continued and persistent delay means we’ll only go backwards.”

Opposition Treasury spokesman Damien Tudehope. Photo: NewsWire/ Gaye Gerard

Opposition MPs tried to move six amendments to the government’s workplace compensation overhaul on Tuesday, including moving to strike out a clause increasing the “impairment threshold” required for an injured worker to get lifetime payments.

The government wants to raise the “whole person impairment” WPI threshold for psychological injuries to 31 per cent, which would cut more workers off compensation payments after two-and-a-half years.

But the ambition to crack down on payments has caused an unlikely alliance to emerge between the coalition and the unions, who have labelled the threshold “inhumane”.

Opposition Treasury spokesman Damien Tudehope vowed MPs will attempt to move the same amendments in the upper house.

If the amendments fail, Mr Tudehope said the Coalition will forge ahead with plans to refer the legislation to a parliamentary inquiry – which would prevent the bill passing into law before the new financial year.

The government has warned if the bill does not pass into law this week ahead of iCare insurance premiums increasing on July 1, businesses will end up paying more – a claim the opposition has denied.

Originally published as NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookhey accuses Coalition of $1.9bn workers comp blowout