CA Peace and Freedom Party Statement on Workers' Compensation Scandal

Peace and Freedom Party
California State Central Committee

____________________________

Statement on Workers' Compensation Scandal

By Kevin Akin, State Chair, Peace and Freedom Party
June 7, 2006

The supposed "reform" of California's Workers' Compensation system by a corporatist coalition of Democrats and Republicans is leading to a crisis. Thousands of injured workers, betrayed by a system designed to victimize them and enrich a corrupt few, have nowhere to turn within the official system.
The government apparatus supposedly designed to help them has been taken over by obedient servants of the wealthy and their corporations. Criminal corporations and criminal "public servants" are working together to deny care to injured workers, discredit and blacklist those
who complain, and hide the evidence from the public.
Those who defy them are targeted for prosecution for "fraud", with no real evidence required for district attorneys to go after injured workers and those who help them at the behest of the insurance company profiteers.

One important part of this effort is the Fraud Assessment Commission, whose head is William Zachry, a committed enemy of workers and an official of Safeway Inc. Safeway has become notorious for its abuse of the Workers' Compensation system and its determination to deny required benefits to injured workers. Zachry has been appointed by a democratic governor and reappointed by a Republican governor, a clear example of the collaboration between the two corporate parties against the interests of working people.

As state chair of The Peace an Freedom Party, I call for the
resignation or removal of William Zachry, who is an enemy of all workers and an eager victimizer of injured workers. I further call for the removal of all commission members with corporate ties - a clear majority at this point. Additionally I call on the voters of the state of California to act in their own interest by voting against the
Democratic and Republican officials who have aided and abetted the corporate schemers, including Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and outgoing State Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi and Attorney General Bill Lockyer, who are running for other offices in 2006.

Insurers and corporations involved in illegally denying care to injured workers should face criminal penalties for harm caused to those workers. California needs to abolish the privatized Workers' Compensation System, and establish a single statewide system with decent care and stable rates, cutting the profiteers out of any share in the money.

Kevin Akin
kevinakin1950 [at] hotmail.com

Other resources: http://www.workersmemorialday.com, http://www.ciaw.org and http://www.barbclark.org