In British Columbia our legal system for dealing with personal injury stemming from a motorist such as a car accident is called a tort system.
Tort is defined by Black’s Law Dictionary, 7th edition as “a civil wrong for which a remedy may be obtained, usually in the form of damages; a breach of a duty that the law imposes on everyone in the same relation to one another as those involved in a given transaction.”
To clarify that definition, damages is money payable to the victim.
Just because BC’s tort system awards money for personal injury doesn’t mean the BC government believes money replaces one’s harms and losses. Instead, money is a best effort to compensate what is lost as a result of personal injury.
A system other than a tort system is called the no-fault system. Some people refer to a no-fault injury system as a meat chart because a person receives a set amount of money based on the specific injury. It’s a formulaic compensation scheme that doesn’t take into account personal circumstances (other than lost wages).
Naturally there are strong proponents of the tort system and strong proponents of the no-fault system. Presently, there are more tort jurisdictions in the North America; however no-fault is a prominent system. The only real downside to a tort system is in some cases an injured person who fails to prove injuries is not compensated. The same can happen in a no-fault system. The only real difference is if in a tort system the injured person loses their case, that person may have to pay the costs of the other side. Typically such a penalty doesn’t exist in a no-fault system.
The advantage to the no-fault system is some people claim a no-fault system is more efficient because it’s not lawsuit oriented. However, victims are typically not nearly as well compensated. Also, injured people in a no-fault system can have their claims wrongfully denied resulting in under-compensated incidents.
In response to the efficiency argument in a no-fault system, it’s important to know that most personal injury cases in a tort system resolve well before a lawsuit ramps up. This means most cases resolve before there is a large expense in the system.
The fact that in a tort system there is final recourse in a court means that wrongdoers will pay more than most no-fault schemes provide. The court as final resort maintains the tort system and is in fact overall efficient and injured people are better compensated for their injuries.
It’s instructive to know that insurance companies want no-fault schemes. Given that insurance companies most often pay out tort claims, it seems clear that in the end less compensation is paid out in a no-fault scheme than a tort system. Essentially, no-fault systems put the insurance companies in the driver seat; whereas the tort system puts the injured victim in the driver seat.
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