Like most MPs I’ve been getting heaps of emails from angry motorbike riders about the National government’s massive ACC levy hikes. Yesterday I even had people come to talk to me about it at my regular constituency clinics.
Rick Barker put out a great statement last week which I’m sure reflects the views of bikers everywhere. Rick points out that the cut-off points in terms of cc ratings don’t take into account the relative power of motorcycles. He also points out that many bikers will own several bikes but they can only ride one at a time:
“I have friends who own up to seven bikes, each for different purposes: off-road, trail, touring and collectables – and they could end up paying about $5000 just to ride their bikes. They can only ride one at a time.
Rick also argues that many motorcycle accidents are actually caused by car drivers, not the biker:
“How is it fair that a motorcyclist is knocked off their bike by a car and then charged much higher levies for the experience? This means the victim pays.
Of course motorbikes are also better for the planet because they use less fuel, not to mention they take up less space in the carpark.
I suspect the National government are secretly quite happy that people are getting angry about ACC. They’ll then use that anger to justify their privatisation agenda. How cynical.
Exactly. They know the ridiulousness of it all, and their ideal scenario is that ACC becomes Public Enemy Number One so that they can fob it off to privatisation. Not cool.
At the risk of sounding like a suck up,
, I agree with Chris and Nicola. I think it’s rude to charge motorcyclists more and yes they do save petrol. 
You won’t catch many motorcyclists texting while riding neither.
FWIW I agree with Spud and Chris and Nicola (and cannot be accused of sucking up, though Spud, you seem to be slowing down – only second comment this time)
Tho’ to go off-topic, why you should watch Q&A and the indescribable Mr Holmes on a Sunday morning rather than listen to media comment in your bed, beats me…
(Wow – Thats 2 comments today – must be the weather)
@Leopold – I enjoy politics, though unsuited to it, like Q&A . Not slowing down, but was debating whether to leave this site for good.
You highlight an interesting point, Chris. Why is there an ACC levy incorporated on motor vehicle licencing at all?
Why isn’t all the cost of the motor vehicle account incorporated into the cost of fuel. Surely, the risk of a vehicle being involved in an injury accident correlates to the amount of time it is on the road, not to the mere fact that it exists.
I know people who own vintage motorcycles and vintage cars that only take them out on the road two or three times a year, yet they pay the same levy with their licence fee as is paid on a vehicle that is used every day.
BTW, over at frogblog, frog has started an interesting series of analyses of the various cuts that the Nats are proposing to ACC cover and entitlements.
p.s. I normally watch Q&A in bed.
Spud @ 11.10 Don’t do it. Your comments are great.
Yeah Spud, who cares what anyone says?This site without you would be worse off if you left.
Yes Spud, we need you. While I was a bit tough is saying you were Trevs footstool, Farrar has done very well out of being Bill English’s ottoman
ok.
If anyone should be pinged with higher ACC premiums, it should be those who cause the most potential injury & damage while getting off lightly – in other words, truckers and SUV drivers. Small problem – the Govt isn’t likely to bite the hand that purportedly feeds it.
On the wider ACC issue, I won’t be at all surprised if the ambulance chaser industry is rubbing its hands with glee.
If you want your lie to be believe tell a whopper. ACC ain’t broke. The Herald made a good fist yesterday of putting facts in front of the public. But after months of listening to the sky is falling at ACC I’m pretty sure most people are looking upward and thinking about buying hard hats. Pfft.
And motorbikes? What about all those off roaders and dirtbikes and farmbikes that never go on road and aren’t registered? Their accidents are counted in ACC stats but they aren’t paying levies.
Add ACC to the cost of fuel. Fair and equable. Big users pay more.
And don’t change the no fault basis – that’s not cost effective – unless you’re a lawyer or an insurance company? Oh that’s right – they’re National’s fundy friends.
I ve been riding motorbikes for twenty years and have never claimed acc due to an accident and find it almost criminal to hike the levies by this amount
I,d like to no how much acc pays out for injuries in rugby,mountain biking and other reacreational sports which dont have to pay the levies we do
I’m not into conspiracy theories, although I suspect the holdup on the new ACC legislation is ACT wants to open ACC to competition, but the Maori Party want to keep close to the status quo.
Anyway, I have a point to make – ACC is a no fault system. So we levy on the basis of the overall risk attached to the users activity. I’m on the lowest private insurance premium group for my own car (and have been since turning 30, when the youth premium finally disappears), but I pay the same ACC levy on registration and petrol as the multiple drunk driver/boy racer.
Similarly, I paid no extra premium when I played Premier Grade rugby as a young man and kept getting my body smashed up every weekend.
We need to open ACC to competition so we can shop around for competitive rates. That will soon sort out the lies from the reality.
Just like car insurance then labrat ?
You wait till have have a claim, then you will find all about better rates.
Meanwhile , no chance of the people injured ‘getting a better deal’, its still highly regulated. No mention of competition there, that would mean ‘right to sue’
If ACC isn’t broke, why are they increasing levies?
And yes GWW, just like car insurance, where I can elect lower premiums in return for higher excesses, and where I get no-claim discounts on my premiums. Currently I’m paying more for ACC levies than I do for all other insurances combined, and I haven’t made a claim on ACC for over a decade.
And frankly, I’d much rather we completely axed this welfare and replaced it with the right to sue.
I havent claimed a cent in insurance for my house in 20 years either, and its around $10 a week . A single claim could be 250,000.
AS for the right to sue, Aussies have that, and their premiums are much higher. Does reality ever come into your thinking.
The reality is that there is a big hole in the coffers at ACC. Denying it is one option, and obviously Labour’s chosen option. The other options have recently been suggested as cutting benefits, introducing an ‘excess’, and raising levies. It is likely that all three are going to be introduced. Now I’m fine with all of that except the increased levies, which I’m quite pissed off about. IMO Labour lied about ACC in the Prefu. In your opinion it seems there’s nothing wrong with ACC and National are lying about it to ’soften us up for privatisation’? Given they campaigned about opening up parts of ACC for competition I don’t see why they’d need to ’soften us up’
So tell me, do you think National are lying about the state of ACC?
Labour didnt lie in the prefu!!. How could they , when it was written by treasury.
Now English set up an inquiry where they got to choose all goalposts and they found that Treasury didnt even follow its own rules for doing these things.
Heres the Treasury chief taking the blame
“The Inquiry released today concluded that the ACC funding shortfall should have been disclosed in the 2008 Pre-election Economic and Fiscal Update (PREFU) in terms of what is required by the Public Finance Act 1989.
“The Treasury takes responsibility for this error, and I have expressed my apologies and regret to the Minister of Finance. I accept the conclusions of the Inquiry and commit to acting speedily on the Inquiry’s recommendations. The Minister of Finance will be kept informed of the Treasury’s progress in taking action on this matter,” Mr Whitehead said
http://www.treasury.govt.nz/publications/media-sp...
Really LR , you never seem to let reality come into it.
National can do what they wish, and Labour can all so turn around and reverse it all.
Alright, I am getting a bit frustrated with the whole ACC debate. Would someone please elaborate/provide the truth about it.
Is AAC really in debt – or is it a paper debt?
Does ACC have an account worth mega bucks?
IF Labour is at fault, please elaborate as to why this is the case – actual fact and not some guess would be helpful.
Cheers – because then I may be able to make an informed contribution based on actual fact rather than ranting about what it is about ACC that brasses me off – of which there is a few areas – equity or lack of – for one.
My understanding of the situation is this:
ACC was “pay-as-you-go” scheme – that is, every year it collected levies to pay all it’s costs for that year, including all the costs for injuries from previous years. This is how the Public Health and WINZ services work – we don’t collect taxes to cover on-going treatment costs for all patients diagnosed with illness this year to keep taxes lower now.
Over the last decade, ACC has been slowly moved to a pre-funded scheme – that is, levies are collected for all costs incurred for injuries that happen in the year, including all costs that will be paid out in the future. This is how insurance companies work (and also the Cullen Super Fund) and ensures that the scheme won’t run out of money in the future when increases become politically unpalatable. For instance, motorcyclists have very high compensation requirements because coming off a motorcycle at moderate urban speed can cause serious injury, whereas car drivers in a similar accident will walk away with scratches, bruises and perhaps a broken limb.
I don’t like the shrillness of this debate, and think ACC is generally a worthwhile activity for Government as relying on the courts to sort out compensation for injry is not a practical method. However, I am concerned that ACC has meant the consequences of extreme risk taking is passed onto the community as a whole – if you drive drunk and crash, you can still get ACC coverage.
The bit about it costing the constituent $5,000 for bikes including off road bikes. Its a false argument, off road bikes don’t use the road and thus aren’t registered, and don’t pay ACC. The same goes for some trail bikes.
If I own 7 cars I still have to pay 7 lots of registration for them, why should motorbikes be any different. Some race cars even have to be registered for the road (rally cars are one example), and would only do a few hundred non race k’s a year. There’s lots of holes and bad outcomes in all legislation. Motorbike owners shouldn’t be treated any differently to any other vehicle owner. Imagine if the law was changed to say an owner only had to pay 1 rego for all their vehicles, bus companies and other transport companies would then only need to pay 1 rego fee for the year, even if they had a fleet of 20-100 vehicles.
Bike owners especially moped riders have had it far to easy for a number of years. Mopeds don’t have to meet any requirements to be on the road, just they have to be less than 50cc, no warrant checks, even once a year. I feel for some of the bigger bike owners, who usually are more experienced, but the owners of smaller bikes need to pay more for their lack of experience or tests.
I totally agree with your comments hamish but i feel as a motorcyclist i dont have any issue with a rise in levies but this amount is to much i only ride on the road so yes i pay levies and owning more than 1 motorcycle i have to pay double no arguements from me.
But i feel they need to start look at this group of people who use motorbikes for reacreational purposes who make claims these people should also pay a levy or some sort of access if they are going to make a claim for injuries trail biking or what ever they do i feel thats only fair as these people make up a large number of motorcylce related claims
hi,
What happened to my post to this discussion two nights ago?
How much does the moderator delete?
It was along the lines of regardless of how many vehicles each of us have, we can only drive one at a time. So, put all the ACC, rego and as many other costs as possible all into the fuel taxes, then people will think about which mode of transport to use for which trip – car, motorbike/scooter, push bike, etc.
Up front or annual charges are grumbled about at the time of payment, and then quickly forgotten. ‘Pay as you go’ (ACC in fuel tax) has a greater influence on behaviour change.
regards
Russell