THE PRESS WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 1982. Paying Fagan’s bills

Press, 24 November 1982, Page 16

THE PRESS WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 1982. Paying Fagan’s bills

A safe-cracker accidentally blows off his hand while fixing charges to a' strong-room door; a burglar falls and breaks his bones while trying to gain illegal entry to a building. They have been injured while breaking some of the laws that society has created to protect itself. By virtue of another law that society has created, they are also entitled to accident compensation payments funded by the people against whom their criminal activities are directed. The seeming injustice of this has disturbed some people. In response, the Government has taken the opportunity of a review of accident compensation legislation to put before public scrutiny the question of compensation payments in such instances. A Parliamentary Select Committee is studying a bill, part of which would give the Accident Compensation Corporation the power to withhold all or part of any compensation for personal injury suffered in the course of criminal conduct. The proposed change has attracted the attention of many who have made submissions on the bill, and the reaction has been mixed. Most objections to compensation for injuries suffered while engaged in criminal activity are based on a common argument. - This can be summarised as a belief that those who deliberately set themselves outside the laws of society do so at their own peril and should forfeit the benefits afforded by society. This feeling is widespread and understandable; it also fails to take into account practical and logical objections to exempting injuries received in the commission of a crime. The New Zealand Law Society summarised most of these objections in its submissions to the Select Committee and found itself in the company of the Federation of Labour and Combined State Unions in doing so. The society referred to the principles on which the scheme is based: compensation for the consequences of unintended personal injury without regard to fault, and comprehensive entitlement. When the community accepted the scheme, it also adopted those principles. As a result, injuries sustained in criminal activity cannot be excluded. The only exception can be wilfully, selfinflicted injury. Because no distinction is made at present between injuries received in the

commission of a crime and other injuries, no figures are available on the savings that might be made if the proposed change is adopted. The Law Society was probably correct, and has not been contradicted, when it said that the savings would be slight and far out-weighed by the difficulties of excluding criminals. A change to exclude injuries in this category would create extra work for the corporation’s staff and could result in an increase in fraudulent claims. Investigation of these would create even more work and could delay the adjudication of legitimate claims to the detriment of genuine claimants. Under the accepted principles of the scheme, a person who loses an arm is compensated for the loss of the arm. The compensation is not intended to be a measure of society’s opinion of whether the injured person is a good citizen. Sanctions for criminal behaviour exist in the criminal code and offenders, injured or not, are liable to the same penalty upon conviction for the same degree of offence. The Law Society argues that withholding compensation from criminals creates a double punishment and would cause inevitable injustice and discrimination between offenders. This is quite correct, although it should be noted that the society’s own members may act on a different premise when, in pleas for reduction of penalty, they ask the courts to take into account the injuries already suffered by offenders as a result of their offending. When such pleas are successful, discrimination between offenders will occur — to the benefit of the injured criminal eligible for compensation. The present compensation system is imperfect, but the proposed change could introduce graver flaws. Grey areas would abound. The safe-cracker and the burglar are easily identified, but how is the corporation to know that the tired businessman who crushed his hand in the office safe was at work at the week-end soley because it gave him the opportunity to cook the books? The Accident Compensation Corporation is not a court of criminal law, nor should it be required to become one. Its province is, and should remain, ensuring that adequate compensation is available to persons injured by accident.