Stuart Kightley says the personal injury scheme proposed by the Association of British Insurers will do nothing to protect consumers

A recent editorial remarked that 'we are suddenly being bombarded with the consumer interest' (see [2006] Gazette, 9 February, 14). No danger of that in the comment piece that appeared beneath, in which Stephen Haddrill of the Association of British Insurers (ABI) breathed the oxygen of publicity into his new scheme for personal injury claims.


It seems the idea is simple. The injured person cuts out the middle man (his lawyer) and deals direct with the person who injured him (let us call him the accident partner) and/or the insurers (for argument's sake, the accident facilitator). The injured party simply completes the accident facilitator's form (assuming he did not injure his hands, arms, eyes or brain), detailing his case on duty, breach, causation and loss, and sends it to the accident facilitator (or AccFac).


The injured does not need legal advice because it is only a bit of form filling, or does he need to investigate the case or contact witnesses because the AccFac (why not Fac?) will do that for him.


At the end of three months, the Fac will get back to the injured (honest) to inform him whether or not his claim has been successful. If so, he need only attend the Fac's doctor for a report on why he has not yet returned to work and within another three months (yes, really) he can expect to receive the Fac's valuation. He is entitled to legal advice on the tariff figure ascribed to his claim, and to mediation if he is still not happy.


If he is really difficult and insists he needs a lawyer, he is of course perfectly entitled to find one, either now or after a liability denial, but the scene of crime will be stale and the bodies hidden.


It is proposed that this scheme applies to considerably more than 90% of all personal injury claims. At a stroke, the lengthy, costly and generally troublesome business of accident litigation becomes just another consumer process. Like 'supermarket law' - but without the law.


Undoubtedly the ABI is a powerful and respected voice in the debate on civil justice reform. It is perhaps a measure of that power that the recent 'compensation culture' campaign, with its weekly stories of cancelled school trips, abandoned pancake races and banned conkers, prompted the government to legislate on the issue even though nobody believes - and that includes the government and the ABI - that such a culture exists in this country. Perhaps emboldened by that success, the ABI has now turned its guns on the compensation system itself.


The best evidence is that the cost of personal injury claims is not increasing and that recent hikes were down to government and insurance industry policies. The Better Regulation Task Force says that per capita tort costs in the UK are near the bottom of the industrial world's league table. On delay, there already exists a protocol that requires defendants and their insurers to investigate and respond on liability within three months. The problem is that they all too often delay, so that the claimant has little option but to litigate.


At least the stakeholders have engaged the idea of reform to the personal injury system and real concessions and improvements have been made, such as the recent fixed costs and fixed success fees schemes.


But back to the consumer - there is nothing in the ABI's proposed scheme that protects or promotes the interest of the consumer.


In fact, it does the precise opposite and dismantles the machinery designed to give the injured person a fair chance of redress.


Stuart Kightley is a partner at London-based law firm Osbornes and chairman of the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers' costs and funding group