South Australia's WorkCover workers' compensation scheme is "buggered" and needs to be replaced, the state government says.
Industrial Relations Minister John Rau said the system is not working satisfactorily for anyone involved and attempts to patch it up over many years had failed.
"There's so much invested hostility in the system from all quarters that the intelligent thing to do is go back to the drawing board and start again," Mr Rau told reporters on Monday.
"The actual scheme, the WorkCover scheme is buggered. Nobody is defending it."
WorkCover administers workers' compensation for more than 430,000 employees of almost 50,000 businesses in SA.
Last year it managed more than 16,000 claims, collected $667 million in employer levies and paid out more than $809 million in claims, leaving a ballooning gap.
Mr Rau said the government would appoint a new WorkCover board within the next 10 days and expected to reveal proposals for a new scheme next year.
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