How about both? No-one says that National can’t be cynical and opportunistic at the same time. They’ve probably been searching for things to attack the previous Government with (that don’t require them to step in and do the hard work of fixing), and this was the first target. We might see a string of such criticisms in the next couple of months – I’d be surprised if we didn’t.

anyway, quickly asking about 15 people got 4 versions of “I haven’t seen the news”, 12 versions of “they are having a dig at labour” and 1 “was that to pay for the plane to Thailand?” – OK so I made the last one up but I didn’t get one response attributing any sort of ‘blame’ and therefore representation of ACC as dysfunctional and thus enouraging privatisation.

I did a follow up question asking whether they think this should encourage ACC to be privatised and quelle surprise? They all couldn’t see any such link.

So guys, the trouble about looking for conspiracies whatever one’s political affiliation is that they are really easy to find especially when they don’t exist. Both sides of the centre divide do it and tend not to be believed by the middle of the road people.

I don’t believe – I reckon key is taking the opportunity to twist the knife – more likely to be a distraction from taking the time over sending the wright brothers’ spare plane over to Thailand … oops or is that a conspiracy theory? More believable than the ACC one to me though.

Not quite sure why we need an enquiry, surely Its not surprising that any organisation that relies on investments is having a major shortfall in income at the moment….

I’ve blogged about that over at g.blog Lynn.

Of course there is no logical connection (unless the privatisation plans go further than the earners account that is in announced National policy), but creating the perception of ACC as a dysfunctional organisation will help neutralise public opposition to privatisation.

there you go again… beating up the beat-up.. whattis this – you in put training or something!

“non-earners” was how I heard the aspect under consideration. Small bikkis..

Who’d wannabe a small bikkis beanbagger.. unless of course the government platform made it pay..

“Labour have given National a free pass to open up the earners account to competition.”

So a cost increase in the non-earners account of the ACC gives NACT a free pass to play with the earners account. Ah yes I see that you have the Key logic impediment syndrome down (or are possibly infected).

I see that dog-whistle politics by the NACT isn’t going to stop merely because they’re in government. This looks to me to be exactly the tactics followed by the Nats in 1990. Take normal operational decisions and make them too hard. Solving them requires a sacrifice by people who aren’t them or their mates.

And you wonder why we don’t trust these dipshits ?

Exhibit one: There knowledge of a $1 billion dollar shortfall in the ACC acount before the election. No dispute about this.

Exhibit two: Their promise to REDUCE ACC charges after the election.

So, they were clearly writing cheques they couldn’t cash. It was all about TRUST, remember.

Of course Key knows only decisions approved by Cabinet can be included in the Prefu – and Cabinet couldn’t make a decision about a heated election issue like ACC in the election period. That’s Constitution 101.

I’m not sure that the requirements of the PrEFU are as basic as Constitution 101, but the point remains that it could have been publicly announced, irrespective of the PrEFU. Along with all the reasons and the rationale behind it etc.

That it wasn’t announced somewhere (in the PrEFU, or a press-release or somewhere) does make it seem as though something was being deliberately hidden.

Jono, I don’t think that for a second. What I know is that the calls from the neo-liberal right have got a lot stronger over the last week and that they are obviously feeling they are in a position to flex some muscle now.

John Key held an “urgent” media conference. Don’t think he did so because he’d only just found out about the ACC issue (which I do think was badly handled by Labour). They would have had the information for a day or two and have been quietly circulating it around friendlies while deciding on the best strategy to officially release it for maximum political impact. In this case the political impact they wanted was a general sense of unease about the integrity of ACC. That is, a climate in which their privatisation scheme is less controversial.

This is an anchor story. What you’ll see over the next few weeks, or months, will be a series of stories about ACC “failure” all of which hark back to this one but all of which would be too minor to get real coverage without this anchor. In short they’ve found an issue they can big up the spin on (as I understand it, it is not that big a deal) and decided to use it.

She does say that this is not a major amount as ACC pays out 3.6 billion a year. From my calculations, this must be a blow out of 13% from this one sector of the overall ACC account.

What shocks me is that my knowledge of government funding is so poor, that I would expect a 270 million blow out to be considerable (especially if it’s to be 1 billion over 3 years), yet the commentary on here and from the Labour party seems to imply that it’s not that much money and didn’t warrant a speedy investigation when flagged back in May.

What is considered a considerable amount in government spending?

It’s quite a stretch to say Labour has been dishonest over ACC funding given the reasons provided in the documents released by John Key yesterday.

In any case, I would have thought you’d base your decision on whether to privatise the ACC scheme on the basis of what will provide the best outcome for the public, not on whether your opponent is perceived to have given you a ‘free pass’. Good try though Tim.