pbrown@mollp.com
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While government efforts to search for efficiencies in an attempt to reduce insurance rates should be applauded, its concept of a new dispute resolution system missed the mark, Toronto critical injury lawyer Patrick Brown tells Law Times.
Through Bill 171, the Fighting Fraud and Reducing Automobile Insurance Rates Act, the Ontario government is attempting to speed up the system, though some lawyers say the plan falls short, the article says.
The proposed legislation removes the right to choose to go to court and separates disputed claims for benefits from tort proceedings, the report continues, noting it means a system of parallel litigation for those seeking to sue in addition to claiming accident benefits.
“No one gets, on the major claims, . . . why they would force them in the new dispute resolution system to take away the right to sue,” Brown says in Law Times. “You do that and you’re going to force more things to be litigated on two fronts.”
Brown, partner with McLeish Orlando LLP, suggests if parties could continue to bring the more significant accident-benefits cases in the court system along with the related tort action, efficiencies could still be found.
