Whiplash Bill passes unamended in final reading

Labour shadow justice ministers had tabled an amendment to limit the proposed raising of the small claims limit in the Civil Liability Bill.

The Bill includes proposals to raise the limit for Road Traffic Accidents from its current level of £1000, to £5000. Labour amendments suggested the limit should be raised to no more than £1500.

However, it was voted down in the final reading on Tuesday, meaning the Bill will receive royal assent in its current form.

An Association of British Insurers spokesperson said: “We are pleased to see the Civil Liability Bill and its associated reforms taking another step forward. It’s needed to fix our broken personal injury compensation system.”

Janet Connor, director of insurance at AA said: “Of note is that secondary legislation will see the small claims track for minor injuries will be raised from £1000 to £5000 for road traffic accident injury claims and to £2,000 or other personal injuries in secondary legislation. This means that legal costs would not usually be awarded for claims below £5,000.  This should stop the huge number of cold-call claim firms encouraging people to make claims for injuries they may not even have suffered or for minor aches and pains that ordinarily, they would ignore.”

However, Brett Dixon, president of the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers, said the Bill was purely about the profit margins of insurers.

He said: “[The government] has been utterly determined to make these reforms happen since being seduced by insurance industry rhetoric. Genuinely injured people at either end of the scale have been vilified for the sake of saving a supposed £35 on each premium. Hard-working, genuine motorists whom ministers and insurers claim to represent will find their compulsory insurance cover will not be sufficient when they need it.”

Vidisha Joshi managing partner of Hodge Jones & Allen, said: “I am saddened but not surprised that the government refused to budge on the Civil Liability Bill yesterday, even when it came to protecting children and other vulnerable individuals from the new regime. Claimant lawyers will, however, continue to make the case to protect their clients and access to justice, and with secondary legislation to implement much of the bill still to be agreed, there remains much to play for.

“The government should be aware that we as a firm, and many others, will be watching very closely to see if the proposed online portal for claims will actually deliver the experience minister Rory Stewart said yesterday that it should. If history is anything to go by Ministry of Justice IT projects are not without their issues, as has been seen before with the problems caused by it introducing other systems in personal injury before they were ready. We hope that officials have learned their lesson that rushing implementation to meet an arbitrary deadline does not serve anybody’s interests.”