B.C.’s Attorney General has announced new changes to help deal with the financial mess at ICBC.
Dave Eby announced a reform to civil rules at BC Supreme Courts which will limit the number of experts and expert reports crash-related court cases.
“This change, which comes into effect today, allows each party in a vehicle injury dispute to have one expert and report for vehicle actions where a notice of fast-track has been filed, for example cases valued at under $100,000 dollars, and up to three experts and reports for all other vehicle actions.”
He says limiting the number of adversarial experts in crash-related cases brings B.C. in line with other provinces.
“There is no doubt this decision may have a significant impact on how lawyers approach their clients’ claims. I have no doubt that some lawyers will be concerned about this change, despite British Columbia talking about the problem with unlimited adversarial experts since 2006, at least,” he says.
“What we’re trying to address is the excesses of the system that don’t advance any interests. It doesn’t advance any interests to have six-plus adversarial experts on a claim. It doesn’t advance any interests to spend $50,000 expense to resolve a $100,000 dollar claim. So what we’re trying to do is introduce proportionality into the system.”
Eby says the change will save up to $400 million per year for ICBC. Other reforms to ICBC coming into effect on April 1st are projected to save another $1 billion dollars annually as well.
ICBC is on pace for a $1.18-billion-dollar loss in its current fiscal year, which ends on March 31, which comes on the heels of a $1.3-billion-dollar deficit in its previous fiscal year.”