Civil Liability Bill [Lords]

Ruth George Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons
Tuesday 4th September 2018 Commons Chamber

[Richard Burgon]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. This goes completely against the principle of equality of arms.

We agree with the Justice Committee and the recommendation of the Jackson review that there should be an increase in the small claims limit only in line with inflation. That would mean a rise to £1,500, not the £2,000 currently proposed. If the Government were to propose a £1,500 limit today or to accept Labour’s amendment that we will propose in Committee, that would help to build a much broader consensus around this currently divisive legislation.

[Ruth George (High Peak) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that in employment cases, it is not just about an inequality of arms, but the fact that a worker has to take on both their employer and their insurance company? It is very difficult for a vulnerable worker who has been injured to look their employer in the eye one on one and take them on. That is why they need legal support.

[Richard Burgon]

That is a very important point indeed. All too often, the human experiences of the individuals who have been injured or discriminated against at work are forgotten. I thank my hon. Friend for bringing that perspective to bear.

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[Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)]

Let me begin by declaring an interest, in my role as chair of the all-party parliamentary group for insurance and financial services. Before my election in 2015, I also spent more than 20 years working as an insurance broker, so I have had a lot of experience of dealing, in the front line, with claims such as those that we are discussing this evening.

I think it important for Members to understand the scale of the problem that we face, and I want to talk about that before dealing with the specifics of the Bill. Reforming this industry does not just mean tackling the cold calls that I am sure colleagues on both sides of the House have had to endure from people informing them that they have had an accident when, in many cases, they have not; it also means addressing the out-of-hand compensation culture that has been allowed to evolve in the United Kingdom. When so much money is at stake for the multi-million-pound personal claims industry, the reality of whether someone has sustained a genuine injury is often merely an obstacle to be overcome, rather than a barrier to the making of a claim.

Over the last decade, the number of personal injury claims resulting from road traffic accidents has risen by 40%, although vehicles have become safer, and there has been a long-term decline in the number of road accidents of nearly a third. The Department for Transport’s 2016 annual road casualties report showed a 3% reduction in the 2015 figure, and the 2016 figure was the lowest on record. Let me put that in context. According to data from the Compensation Recovery Unit, during 2017-18 the number of personal injury claims rose to 650,000 from 460,000 in 2005-06, about 85% of them being whiplash-related. In the last year alone, the insurance industry was able to identify 69,000 motor insurance claims that it considered to be fraudulent, and undoubtedly many more went undetected.

[Ruth George]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Craig Tracey]

I am sorry, but given the time constraint and the fact that many other Members want to speak, I will crack on.

During my latter years as a broker, I saw the attitude change. Exaggerated claims were often seen as a “victimless crime”, and as being okay, because the insurance industry would pick up the tab. Although the amounts of compensation paid for soft-tissue claims are relatively small, the associated claims-handling costs—including the costs of investigation, processing, lawyers’ fees and medical reports—are disproportionately large. For example, a claim for about £1,000 may ultimately cost the insurer two or three times that amount. It is clear that fraudulent claims have a direct impact on the cost of every one of our constituents’ motor insurance premiums. Given an average of about 60,000 vehicles per constituency, there is a considerable cost. According to the Association of British Insurers, for every pound paid out in compensation, nearly another 50p is then paid to the claimant’s lawyer in costs.

The Bill gives us an excellent opportunity to fix the current broken system, a system that is not working for millions of motorists throughout the country. It will bring about long-overdue reforms of personal injury compensation. It will provide a fairer system for claimants, insurance customers and taxpayers by creating a more proportionate compensation system in the case of both whiplash-style claims and claims to which the personal injury discount rate is applied, while ensuring that claimants still receive 100% compensation. Part 1 sets a new fixed tariff for pain, suffering and loss of amenity, and sets a higher financial threshold for lawyers’ recovery of their legal fees from insurers. The new system will also make it much easier and faster to make a claim, with a new online portal ensuring that small claims can be processed efficiently.

It is important to note that larger claims following serious injuries, and any payments for medical bills or loss of earnings, will be unaffected. The savings will result from the cutting out of a very expensive middleman, which must be a win-win for our constituents. The findings of a recent survey back that up, showing that nine people out of 10 think that in this area legal costs are too high, and 71% would be happy to use an online portal to make their claims rather than requiring legal representation.

Supporting this Bill will help provide a fairer environment that will inevitably lower motor insurance premiums for millions of motorists. The Government consider that the reforms would lead to savings of about £1.1 billion and rightly expect that to be passed on to motorists, which would result in an average saving per motor insurance premium of about £35. Many insurers have already committed to pass on cost benefits to their customers in a letter to the Lord Chancellor, which was signed by firms representing 86% of the ABI’s UK motor and liability insurance business members. That letter provides the clear intention of the industry and, significantly, the benefits that this Bill represents to every motorist in the UK.

I had hoped to speak a little more about the discount rate, but time is against me. I am, however, very supportive of the reforms and it is striking that the Government have had to set aside £6 billion extra for the NHS alone just to cover potential claims over the coming years. Every day that these reforms are not put into effect customer premiums will remain higher than should be the case, which will have a particular impact on old and young drivers who usually already have to pay the highest premiums.

Finally, although this is not directly attached to the Bill, I welcome the wider proposals which suggest an increase to the small claims track limit to £5,000. The current level has not been increased since 1991 and has been changed to £10,000 for virtually all other types of claim.

It is clear that compensation culture has got way out of hand and penalises everyone who insures a car. When I first started in insurance, whiplash or soft tissue injury claims were virtually non-existent, but over time they have grown to become a significant manifestation, which, as we have heard, cost motorists anywhere between £40 and £90 extra on their policy.

Critically, this is an industry where in many instances the claimant is not the main beneficiary. The measures put forward in the Bill will not, as is suggested by its opponents, affect the ability of people to seek fair compensation for their injuries or suppress access to justice, but will, more reasonably, cut the incentives for a claimant industry to disproportionately profit from our constituents’ misfortune.

I have had dicussions with a range of insurers and they are committed not only to passing on the savings directly to consumers, but also to provide a renewed focus on rehabilitation from the injuries, which from my experience of dealing with genuinely injured customers was exactly what they wanted. These reforms are long overdue and will deliver benefits to millions of motorists, while delivering on the Government’s manifesto commitment to

“reduce insurance costs for ordinary motorists by cracking down on exaggerated and fraudulent whiplash claims”.

That is why I am backing the Bill’s progress today.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Philp (Croydon South) (Con)]

My interest in this area stems from a very minor accident that my wife and I had a few years ago, I think, on the M5. We had a minor collision, and for a year after that I was phoned on my mobile on almost a weekly basis by a claims management company trying to get me to submit a fraudulent personal injury claim. No matter how often I told them that I, my wife and my children had no neck injury, they insisted on trying to incite me to manufacture or claim that I had such an injury with the purpose of making a fraudulent claim. I was told, “You can get £3,000 for just saying your neck hurts.” Even as recently as the past two weeks, my wife and I have both separately had automated phone calls—robo-phone calls—from claims management companies asking us to phone back if we think we have ever been involved in an accident.

That experience prompted me to look further into this subject, and colleagues have cited some of the figures. The hon. Member for Jarrow (Mr Hepburn) asked where the evidence is that there is a problem with widespread fraudulent claims. I have my own anecdotal experience of being personally incited to commit fraud, which obviously I did not do, but the figures are compelling. Over the past decade, the number of road traffic accidents has fallen by 31%, so how can it be that personal injury claims have increased by 50%? The answer is of course that these claims management companies are farming claims and inciting people to commit fraud, as they did with me.

[Ruth George]

rose—

[Chris Philp]

Let me finish the point, then I will take an intervention.

[Chris Philp]

I will give way in a moment. The hon. Member for Jarrow also said that judges have decided that injuries—[Interruption.] I am grateful for the heckling from my own side. The hon. Member for Jarrow said that judges had made these compensation awards, but of course that is not true: under qualified one-way costs shifting, insurance companies have a massive financial incentive to settle even claims without merit before they go to court, because even if they win they pay the costs and the costs are often much bigger than the value of the claim. So insurance companies simply settle the claim without a medical examination and without it ever going to court. Therefore, all these compensation claims have not been adjudicated by a judge, although the hon. Gentleman erroneously suggested that they had; they are simply settled immediately because that is the cheapest way of doing it. There is no judicial intervention in almost any of these cases.

[Ruth George]

My intervention is a question to you, asking how you think the claims management company got hold of your details to be able to phone you and your wife about your accident. Do you agree that your details must have been passed on by insurance companies, who then complain about these very claims management companies, because that is the only place they could have got your personal details and the accident information from? That is what we should be cutting down on.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Order. May I just reiterate that the word “you” should be used to address the Chair? My personal details have not been passed on to anybody.

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[Ruth George (High Peak) (Lab)]

I will address my speech to you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

I agree with Government Members that the insurance industry plays a valuable role. It has two main purposes: to ensure that innocent victims are compensated for their suffering and its impact on their lives and that perpetrators are appropriately penalised with higher premiums. Unfortunately, the measures in the Bill will do nothing to effect either of those main aims of the insurance industry, but they will impact heavily on innocent victims and ensure that perpetrators do not pay the costs of their actions.

I agree that we need to combat the problem of claims management companies, as we have heard from Members on both sides of the House. However, as the hon. Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp) set out lucidly, claims management companies are fed information by insurance companies, to enable them to target the victims of accidents. Since that was banned directly, they have been doing it indirectly. Insurance companies are not only feeding claims management companies information to enable them to do that but are profiting from it, and they are now briefing Members that it is a problem with claims management companies.

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Rory Stewart)]

This may be a naive question, but it seems as though two different arguments are being made by Opposition Members. There was a suggestion from the hon. Member for Jarrow (Mr Hepburn) that the direction of the insurance companies is to try to stop anybody claiming. The hon. Lady seems to be arguing that the insurance companies are also fuelling these claims. Can she explain that paradox? How can they can be involved in both at the same time, and how does that work for them financially?

[Ruth George]

I cannot answer for other Opposition Back Benchers. I am speaking as an individual Back-Bench MP with experience of the insurance industry, and the hon. Member for Croydon South set out clearly similar experiences.

Along with Government Members, I have met the Association of British Insurers, but I suspect that it was a slightly less happy conversation, and I will certainly read less of its briefings in my speech. I challenged the ABI on the information coming to claims management companies from insurance companies. It agreed that that was happening and said that the Government could look to stop it. When insurance companies are putting information out to solicitors’ firms, they could ban those firms contacting claims management companies to farm out the information.

[Rory Stewart]

This is a sincere question. The suggestion made by the hon. Member for Jarrow and a number of others is that the entire profit model of the insurance companies is based on charging big premiums and trying to minimise the number of claims, and that that is how they make money. The suggestion is that the entire Bill is driven by the insurance industry trying to stop anybody making claims. At the same time, perfectly reasonably, you are making the argument that the insurance companies are trying to support claims. How do they—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Order. Having brought to the attention of the hon. Member for High Peak (Ruth George) that she must not use the word “you”, I hope the Minister will follow suit.

[Ruth George]

Thank you very much, Madam Deputy Speaker. If the Minister has questions about other Members’ contributions, he really should have addressed them to those Members rather than to me.

There are two sides of the coin here. The Government are not combating the claims management companies at all in the Bill. What they are doing, which I absolutely welcome, is making provision for face-to-face medicals. One would hope that that will combat the fraudulent claims that are made for deliberate car crashes, as well as the other examples that have been cited by Conservative Members.

We also need to ban cold calling. If the Government were prepared to look at those two additional measures—banning cold calling and banning information going from insurance companies to claims management companies—they would find that the problem of excess claims was dealt with to a large degree. I hope that they would commit to doing that before looking to take the measures in the Bill, which will impact on innocent victims of road accidents and accidents at work.

I speak as a victim of several road accidents over 20 years spent commuting into Manchester. When people are nose to nose in traffic, they shunt into the back of other people’s cars—it happens. I have suffered whiplash several times, but in the majority of cases it was not serious, however long it lasted. However, the—fortunately—final accident I suffered has had a very serious impact on me and on my life ever since. As a new mother, I was unable to lift my baby from his cot. I was unable to take our puppy for a walk, because he pulled at my neck. When I tried to return to work, I was unable to do my job effectively because I was unable to work at a computer for more than a couple of hours. Every hour of every day since that accident, I have felt its impact.

Whiplash can even lead to trapped nerves in the neck, which I can assure Members is absolutely excruciating and can happen months after the accident itself. Therefore, whiplash injuries affect the same person differently, and they can affect different people very differently. That is why a tariff, especially at the lower levels proposed by the Government in the Bill, are not a fair way to compensate people. At the moment, a judge looks at not just the injury but the level of that injury and the impact on the victim’s life. That is surely what we should be looking for in a proper and fair compensation culture.

I want to look at employers’ liability cases. USDAW, the shop workers’ union, has estimated that there would be a fivefold increase in the number of employers’ liability cases from its members that ended up in the small claims court rather than in the fast-track system. To make a claim for employers’ liability, employees have to prove their employers’ liability, and that is very hard to do. Cases can be extremely complicated, especially when more than one company is involved, as in the case of a delivery driver making a delivery to a company and suffering an accident there. Is it the fault of the company that provided the lorry or the company the driver was delivering to? That is why employers and their insurers contest claims, and legal costs end up being so high because claims are constantly contested.

It is important that employees can take cases against negligent employers. If employers do not have to pay out for insurance claims, they have no incentive to improve the safety of their workers. That is the second and very important role of the insurance industry: to effectively police those who perpetrate accidents and those who do not. Employers who have suffered multiple accidents at their work places or drivers who have been responsible for accidents would rightly have their insurance premiums increased, and that is surely what we want.

The Bill will make it more difficult for the victims of accidents to take a claim against their employers or insurance companies, and it and the Minister will restrict the very proper role of insurance companies in policing the system to make sure that the perpetrator pays.

I hope that the Minister will reconsider the Bill’s measures, look very carefully at alternatives that would not make victims suffer or enable perpetrators to get away with negligence, drop the proposals to increase the small claims limit and to introduce a tariff for whiplash claims and make sure that our insurance industry operates fairly for the good of everyone.