No-Fault Automobile Insurance In Ontario: A Long And Complicated Story

Abstract

Within the past decade, Ontario has had no fewer than four successive and dif ferent regimes of no-fault automobile insurance. Prior to 1990 there was an "add-on" scheme whereby modest first-party no-fault benefits were added on to the tort system without any formal impairment of tort rights. In 1990 the Liberal government introduced a "modified" plan whereby no-fault benefits were increased but tort was modified in that a plaintiff was ineligible to sue unless s/he met a threshold of permanent and serious injury. Subsequently, the eligibil ity rules for suing in tort (along with benefit levels) have been changed twice with, in each case, separate restrictions for economic and non-economic loss respectively. This paper relates the story of those changes including some of the historical background. @; lb 1 i:IMAu cours de la derni�re decennie, )'Ontario a connu pas moins de quatre regimes differents d'assurance automobile sans egard a la responsabilite. Avant 1990, le versement d'indemnites modestes, sans egard a la responsabilite, etait venu s'ajouter au regime de droit commun de la responsabilite civile, sans diminuer le droit de poursuite des victimes. En 1990, le gouvernement du Parti liberal a augmente !es indemnites, tout en eliminant Jes recours de droit commun a moins de faire la preuve de blessures serieuses et a carac�re permanent. Par la suite, ces droits de poursuite (de meme que le niveau des indemnites) ont ete modifies a deux reprises en distinguant, a chaque occasion, !es pertes economiques et !es pertes non economiques. L'auteur relate ici cette evolution legislative, en la repla�ant dans son contexte historique.