Image Credit: The Canadian Press

By James Peters / The Canadian Press

ICBC Dumpster Fire

B.C. court tosses limit on medical expert reports in auto claim court cases

Oct 24, 2019 | 3:29 PM

VICTORIA — The British Columbia Supreme Court says Attorney General David Eby acted outside his authority by imposing restrictions on the number of medical expert reports that can be used in auto insurance court claims.

The ruling sets aside the limitation and represents a hurdle for the B.C. government after Eby introduced the change as part of a suite of initiatives to curb costs at the financially troubled Insurance Corp. of B.C.

Justice Christopher Hinkson says limiting the number of medical expert reports to three in a case is unconstitutional and encroaches on the court’s jurisdiction to control its process.

His ruling says it restricts the core function of the court to decide a case fairly using the evidence adduced by the parties.

In other words, he says, it has the effect of requiring the court to play an investigatory function in place of its traditional non-adversarial role.

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Changes to the public insurer’s payments and procedures were announced last year, shortly after Eby referred to ICBC as a “financial dumpster fire.”

The court ruling Thursday morning led to a tense back-and-forth between Eby and various opposition B.C. Liberal MLAs in afternoon question period.

“We were supposed to have a competent attorney general who is managing ICBC. Instead, we have flagrant incompetence, a continuing losing record and no effort whatsoever to do anything that’s going to lead to reduced costs for motorists,” stated B.C. Liberal Leader Andrew Wilkinson.

Former finance minister Mike de Jong pointed out Eby was counting on a positive Supreme Court ruling to save $400 million.

“The attorney and the government now have a $400 million problem,” said de Jong. “There’s only two ways to fix that problem, Mr. Speaker. One is the rates for those families in Clearwater and Cranbrook are going up even further. The second is the finance minister has a $400 million problem in her budget. Which is it?”

But Eby brushed off every opposition attack by pointing to the former Liberal government as the source of ICBC’s fiscal ills.

“Honourable Speaker, I’ve been waiting for two-and-a-half years for a question from the opposition on ICBC,” Eby said.

“Gosh, Honourable Speaker, I wonder how we got here?” Eby sarcastically responded to another salvo. “If only there was some way to know.”

The attorney general took aim at Kamloops-South Thompson MLA Todd Stone, who oversaw ICBC as transportation minister before the B.C. Liberals left power in 2017.

Eby accused Stone of not having the “stones” to ask a question himself. He went on to cite an attempt by Stone to gift the B.C. Automotive Retailers Association a multi-million dollar ICBC training facility as proof of Stone’s mismanagement of the insurer.

“The opposition literally tried to give away ICBC property to lobby groups. That is the incompetent management that our province saw that cost $2 billion,” Eby stated before being drowned out by applause and shouting.