Hardcore Biker
At the BRONZ AKL meeting it was suggested that a fuel levy would spread the load to all vehicles (on and off road) and would be a fairer alternative to loading motorcycle registration. On a vote it lost majority support, but it was a close vote.
What do people think of it as an alternative and are there any other suggestions floating around ?
Rider in training
You do know that their is already an ACC levy on petrol?
Forum whore
it would be seen as subsidy though wouldnt it...cars use more petrol than bikes ....and it would impact those least able to afford it...ie lower social ecomoic groupls with large familiies,with inefficient big ol vans and such....The fairest way is total vehicle expenditure didvided bu total vehicle fleet,irrespective of size colour and creed....or total vehicle expenditure divided by total number of driver licenses.....Originally Posted by vgcspares
Forum whore
I'm thinking including ACC in gas would "capture" - to a degree at least, people like skiers, mountain bikers etc - who use a vehicle to get to their particular "increased risk" sport.
And of course boaties and off road motorsport plus those who ignore the rego law anyway... - I like it
"If you haven't grown up by the time you turn 50, you don't have to!"
Forum whore
An ACC petrol levy is not a one dimensional raise in the price of fuel. At the $1 a litre being bandied around to fund the vehicle account, EVERYTHING would be more expensive, food, public transport, the purchase price of a new bike, and it would cause rampant inflation, which would make your mortgage payments more expensive, which would probably cause a run on the Kiwi Peso. You don't want that.
If a man is alone in the woods and there isn't a woke Hollywood around to call him racist, is he still white?
The instructions are simple...
There is no 'fairest' way to collect levies. But I do think that licence-based levies would approach that ideal. But that would not include those sports motorists who do not have a road-class licence...
Do you realise how many holes there could be if people would just take the time to take the dirt out of them?
Forum whore
License based levy 2012:
Car licence: licence fee $50.00
ACC levy $400.00
Car & bike licence licence fee $100.00
Acc levy $ 1200.00
Car,Bike & HT..............
Fuk dat
sdkfz
The ACC counter is that a family, say, of four people with licenses might each pay the levy - when they have one family car that they share.
This is the reverse of the issue of one bike owner, owning more than one bike and having to pay multiple fees.
What we'd need are some decent statistics to base it all on. (e.g. to compare the two siutations above).
You are right - there will be no "fairest" way.
Measure once, cut twice. Practice makes perfect.
Hardcore Biker
Exactly!!!....I still do not get the plan, firstly everyone complains about the increase in their rego (more money) rather than accepting that, they want to come up with "their own plan" to pay Lord Nottingham and his bunch of rascals...The way they feel it should be paid...increases of any sought only lift inflation, we all have to get the money from somewhere to survive.
The instructions are simple...
No no....You pay one levy...the one that covers the 'most risky' licence class you hold. I said it here
Do you realise how many holes there could be if people would just take the time to take the dirt out of them?
Deus ex ukulele
Despite what their proponents claim, ACC levies have nothing to do with fairness. As a salaried worker, purchaser of motor spirits and the owner of multiple vehicles, I am already being multiply sodomised by this august corporation.
I fail to see why ACC has multiple "accounts". If somebody is injured as a result of an accident, why does it matter where and how? No fault surely means no fault.
There are measures to deal with unsafe work places and practices. There should be other measures in place to deal with unsafe motorists and roads.
ACC made a mega industry out of physiotherapy for no good reason. It now appears to be intent on making a growth industry out of lawyers as it seeks to find new and imaginative ways of rejecting claims made against it.
ACC has all the sophistication of a bull elephant on heat. All we need is a brave soul with a very large calibre gun to shoot it in the head.
"Standing on your mother's corpse you told me that you'd wait forever." [Bryan Adams: Summer of 69]
Hardcore Biker
Seems the BRONZ vote was representative then - I made the point that an increased fuel levy would be a tax on everyone and consequently lose us support from non-motorcyclists.
With no other viable alternatives we're left with contesting the amount of the increase on bike registration.
The consensus was that if the increase was unavoidable then we should press for a staged implementation and of course this would then give us more time to mount arguments based on a challenge to the ACC data (assuming we could get our hands on some that was clearer than the mud they're effectively slinging at us).
Forum whore
I think it would be useful to quantify what that increase in fuel levy would be. If it's a matter of a cent or two I'm not sure people would be alarmed.
If you want a motorcyclist already pay far higher sum than car owners.
Car owner - pays car levy and fuel levy.
Motorcycle Owner - pays car levy, motorcycle levy and fuel levy. (most motorcylists own cars)
The proposed increase is unfair because it targets just one group in the community.
Secondly the statistics have been misused.
Thirdly the point of statistic acquisition is the doctors and hospitals. I have had no ACC claims and do a huge amount of motorcycle riding. I have had more injuries riding off road than on road. When a sport/hobby rider who rides off road on an unregistered bike goes into the doctors that claim is invariably recorded as a motorcycle injury when it should have been recorded as a sport injury. ACC is wanting Road Registered riders to pay for non road injuries as and this is unfair. That would be like charging cars for skiing, boating, and anything where you would practically need to use a car to do the sport. Hell lets through rugby into the car stream.
My view is the fuel levy is the way to go and you'd be surprised how small an increase we're talking about. But this idea of trying to build up the reserves over 5 years is ridiculous. National are talking about moving it to 10 years but lets make it 15.
I believe we should face a nil increase and even a reduction to the same rate as petrol driven cars.
A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single motorcycle
Click here for: - Changing Dyslexia, Depression, Anxiety, Trauma, Phobia's, Allergies etc
L-Plate Rider
What guts me the most is that in over 14 years of motorcycling I have made no ACC claims relating to motorcycle accidents. I am a mature and experienced rider who prefers to commute on a high-torque 120cc v-twin.
So why should I be expected to subsidise higher risk riders? I hear car drivers bleating about subsidising "all you motorcyclists", but fuck-it ... they're not subsidising me.
My preference? Leave the ACC levy where it is (or increase it only marginally) and FLAT, but impose an excess for motorcycle related claims.
IF I have an accident that is my fault, I'll gladly pay the excess because I was probably being a dick anyway. If it's not my fault then my insurance company can recover the excess from the other party.
Best of all, I don't have to subsidise other riders whose risk profile is higher than mine.
Read on for more rationale behind this opinion ....
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Motorcycling is my primary means of transport, I have never owned a car. During that 14 years of motorcyling I have had only 3 accidents, neither major enough to warrant any ACC claims, both of which occurred on sub 600cc bikes.
In all 3 cases the other party was technically at fault; but admittedly all 3 were avoidable if I'd been in a more defensive mindset at the time. It is this inexperience that I attribute to those 3 accidents; well, 2 were due to not paying enough attention and one was due to youthful cockiness. Which brings me to by beef about the way these levies are structured...
My personally held theory is that the majority of motorcycle accidents that result in ACC claims break down into these 4 broad categories:
1- motorcyclist was not defensive enough and could have taken steps to avoid the accident (primary cause: inexperience, NOT engine capacity)
2- motorcyclist was suffering from temporary "invincibility complex" (causes: sometimes inexperience, usually too much adrenaline/testosterone, potentially this correlates to engine capacity but I see plenty of fuck-knuckles on 250-400cc racers that fall into this capacity)
3- motorcyclist was "pushing the limits" and went too far; e.g. your typical weekend ride nightmare scenario where someone misses the corner or otherwise blows cover and bins into other vehicles or sturdy and unforgiving scenery (most likely to correlate to power-weight ratio, not engine capacity - if it were engine capacity then ulysses members would be over represented in statistics, right?)
4- "wrong place, wrong time, couldn't see it coming and/or get out of the way fast enough"
I'm not saying these are the only 4 factors, I'm claiming that 98% of incidents that involve an ACC claim would fall into one of these 4 categories.
The point I am trying to empirically illustrate - without any statistics to back it up - is that I don't see how engine capacity correlates to a higher risk profile.
I now own a 1200cc motorcycle and yet for that privilege I am expected to pay for the risk profile of all the young, inexperience, god-complex, careless risk takers on their 250cc Hyosungs when they go blatting around riverhead on a wet sunday and skid under a truck!!
Or is that I'm subsidising all the zippy-about inexperienced hairstylist that get squished between two X5s on their trendy moped?
Perhaps one day I will be "in the wrong place at the wrong time", but I rather hope that the torque of my 1200cc v-twin will help me AVOID injury, not increase my disposition to it. Again - unfair.
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Possible counter-arguments?
>> Excess is unfair to low income earners
Boo hoo! You know what? Stuff costs money. When you have less money you can't afford as much stuff. That is actually as fair as fair can get. Economically "risk" is a type of stuff, and when I have to subsidise yours then THAT is unfair.
Anyway, I'm not suggesting that the excess would have to be paid in full up front. Just like any other government imposed cost (rates, traffic violations, etc) I would expect there would be provisions for paying it over time.
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Other benefits of excess vs a levy.
A higher levy will encourage more riders to ride unregistered bikes; either with no rego at all (not impossible to do) or with counterfeits. An excess will not have this impact.
With the levy approach we run the risk that more of the "high risk" profile riders will avoid paying their levy and yet still contribute cost to the system. The cost, when averaged out in 5 years time, will make it look like motorocyclists are still not paying their way. Eventually ACC will want to raise the levy more to cover costs and that will lead to more levy avoidance.
Only an excess will properly target the risk takers and prevent levy avoidance.
You're nuthin
The fact is that even engaging the quest for alternative funding methods is misguided.
The Nats have cooked the books and created a crisis where none exists.
There is no reason why ACC needs to be a fully funded system.
Let's see someone independent do an audit
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