The Truth About “No Fault” Insurance

There is a rumor that ICBC will try to change the system of insurance in B.C. sometime in 2017 to what is called a “no fault” system. Such systems exist in other Canadian provinces.

In our present system, there is a party who is held at fault and a party who is not at fault, i.e. innocent.  ICBC has to pay the not at fault driver for their injuries and the insurance rates of the at fault driver may go up so that ICBC can recover the money paid out. The present system punishes bad drivers and allows compensation for innocent victims of the bad drivers.

In a “no fault” system, there is nobody held at fault and nobody is compensated.  Both drivers, the at fault and the not at fault, have their treatment funded to some extent and may able to claim some of their lost wages. However, there is no other compensation, no matter how badly injured the person may be.  A “no fault” system rewards bad drivers and punishes the innocent victim.

ICBC will try to sell this no fault system to the drivers of B.C. as a cheaper system. They will say that your car insurance rates will go down. There is no question that may be true for the first year or so, but after that, the rates will go up again. The fact is that this system only benefits ICBC. With nobody being compensated fully for their injuries, they will make record profits. Since ICBC is a Crown corporation, our lovely provincial government will simply scoop up these profits as they have been doing all along.

Everybody can be charmed and fooled by the lure of cheaper rates and everything is good until they or someone they are close to is injured in an accident and is faced with the realities of the “no fault” insurance racket.

By the way, if this terrible system does get put into place, it won’t affect any existing ICBC claims you have, only potential future claims down the road.

The bottom line is that we would be foolish to support ICBC and the provincial government on this latest scam. When ICBC and the government go into propaganda mode later this year, spending hundreds of thousands of your money in radio, TV and print ad campaigns to try to convince you of the virtues of the “no fault” system, don’t be fooled. A leopard doesn’t change its spots.