ACC

Former National Party president Michelle Boag has angrily dismissed suggestions she leaked the email she sent to ACC Minister Judith Collins about her friend Bronwyn Pullar's controversial meeting with ACC managers.

Dunedin lawyer Peter Sara is urging a "culture change" over privacy issues at the ACC after the names of several hundred Otago claimants were included in an email mistakenly sent to Auckland resident Bronwyn Pullar late last year.

Bronwyn Pullar wrote to Cabinet Minister Nick Smith 18 months ago accusing him of covering up corruption at ACC and warning him he would need public relations help in the face of anger over its policies.

With a shaking voice, National MP Nick Smith today announced his resignation from Cabinet in a statement to Parliament.

A mind shift is needed so people stop viewing injuries as "accidents" and instead view them as no different from cancer or heart disease, a visiting Canadian injury prevention specialist says.

Accident compensation officials have backed down and agreed to finance surgery for a young man injured in an avalanche - but only after a lawyer laid out the evidence.

The Government is backing away from plans to rejig the Accident Compensation Corporation to allow competition from private insurers because of concerns it will drive up costs for small and medium businesses and the taxpayer.

The Government is backing away from plans to change the Accident Compensation Corporation to allow competition from private insurers, because of concerns it will drive up costs for small and medium businesses and the taxpayer.

Minister for ACC Judith Collins has criticised her agency's "poorly handled'' response to a massive breach of claimants' information.

Senior ACC manager Philip Murch knew of a potentially major breach of the privacy of more than 6000 claimants for three months but failed to do enough about it, says chief executive Ralph Stewart, who last night apologised for the blunder.