Thursday 22 June 2017
Late on 21 June 2017, the Return to Work Corporation (Crown Claims Management) Amendment Bill 2017 was defeated in the Legislative Council.
The vote was a narrow 8-7.
While it is a win for common sense, it is not likely to be the end of the effort to alter the Crown claims management arrangements. Among the possibilities are:
- A deadlock conference could reach a compromise or the Bill could be re-tabled in a different form (though we assess both as unlikely as the defeated Bill had a single purpose)
- Some sort of third-party administrative arrangement between RTWSA and Crown agencies - this would be something SISA can have no role in unless we are consulted (note that SISA has extensive corporate knowledge of how TPA arrangements operate)
- Adverse action against SISA for its role in the Bill's demise.
Based on the statements made in Parliament, part of the Government's intent appears to be the use of a common IT platform and 'consistent' management. While members are of one view with regard to the impracticality of the latter, the rolling out of the WorkCover/RTWSA IT platform to Crown agencies has been done before with some success through the now retired IDEAS system. This may be part of the program going forward.
If we hear of further developments we will keep you posted.