mib is a limited liability company registered in England and Wales. Insurers wishing to participate in the car insurance business in the UK must be members of the multinational and contribute to its financing.28 The members` contribution is proportional to their royalty income from the car insurance business. This means that the ultimate cost of running the mib lies in all the insurance policies that drivers pay through insurance premiums. It is interesting to note that the obligation for insurers to participate in the mib is the only part of the Road Traffic Act 1988 (rta 1988) that contains the mib.29 Agreements exist between SoSFT and mib. A person wishing to receive compensation must comply with the terms of the mib agreements and submit their claim to the mib. As members of mib, insurers can vote at meetings and appoint people to mib`s technical committee. This therefore underlines the control exercised by members.30 The new agreement maintains the six-week period for appealing a decision of the MIB, but provides that the claimant may, if necessary, apply to the MIB or the arbitrator for an extension of time. This is an implicit criticism of the mib, in particular the voluntary nature of the agreements. The Under Secretary of State replied, among other things, that “these agreements have worked satisfactorily. I do not intend to review the agreements. 51 The Under-Secretary of State did not criticize the voluntary nature of the agreements, the observations received, or the number of complaints received. This highlights a challenge in terms of transparency. Information on how complaints are handled should be available to identify potential problems and challenges faced by victims and the MIB.

Transparency is discussed in more detail below. The arbitrator may also order the claimant to pay the costs of the MIB arbitration if the arbitrator determines that the appeal or cause of the dispute was frivolous; vexatious; otherwise relentless or involved in fraud or fundamentally dishonest. The agreement also allows the arbitrator to order that any amount payable to MIB in this regard may be deducted from the amount remaining to be paid to the plaintiff or from an amount payable for legal fees. As a result of the changes, the MIB`s contribution to litigation costs is generally lower for low-value receivables, but much more generous for higher-value receivables. The new agreement also provides that the applicant may charge additional fees in “exceptionally complex” cases. The Ministry of Transport has launched a consultation to discuss the implications of the decision of the Court of Justice of the European Union in Vnuk, and there will undoubtedly be further changes to the agreement in due course until the result is available. Under the new agreement, there is no right to costs for claims that would have been attributed to the small lane. Provided that the whiplash reforms announced by the government are implemented as announced, from October 2018 this will include all claims for soft tissue injuries lasting less than 24 months and all injuries that receive compensation of less than £5,000 in all cases. The reporting requirement was particularly problematic as the general public is modest about the MIB (not to mention its agreements and requirements) and even if an accident was reported, police assistance could often be less than imminent, especially in accidents where motorcyclists lose control due to diesel accidents and accidents caused by film and the like, unlike the more typical “Hit and Run”. Of course, parliament could pass laws that explicitly regulate the mib. However, the impact on the current agreements is uncertain.

For example, if Parliament decides to maintain the current agreements on mib and add legal provisions to regulate mib, this could lead to confusion and conflict among victims. In addition, problems could include the lack of approval from the insurance industry and the possible removal of flexibility and expertise. Nevertheless, transparency and enforcement could potentially be increased, which brings us to the next part of this article. In law, compensation for victims of uninsured and untracked vehicles is paid by the nominal defendant.113 The nominal defendant pays accident claims from the nominal defendant`s fund. (Section 329(c)(ii) maia 2019 for “uninsured motor vehicle” and section 329(c)(iii) maia 2019 for “unidentified motor vehicle”). This is offset by levies from the insurance industry as well as claims such as .B. with regard to the costs of the driver or the person responsible (Article 351 Maya 2019). Since the role of the nominal defendant is established by law, no private agreement between him and the government is required. Interestingly, the nominal defendant`s law includes three types of vehicles, uninsured vehicles, unidentified vehicles, and vehicles that have an unregistered vehicle licence.114 The first two are important for the purposes of this study, as the United Kingdom does not have the third. With regard to uninsured vehicles, Article 326 Maia 2019 provides, inter alia, that the two new agreements remove the exclusion that uninsured claimants cannot claim property damage. The new version implemented is identical to the revoked agreement, except that it omits the phrase “and no other person” in Article 10(1), allowing legal representatives to act on behalf of the applicant under Article 1(2).

Note that there was a legal review in Regina (RoadPeace Ltd) against the Secretary of State for Transportation [2018] 1 W.L.R. 1293. First, since the 2003 agreement did not provide for it and the agreements therefore do not have retroactive effect, the absence of that agreement before 2017 constituted an infringement of the principle of equivalence in EU law. The High Court rejected the decision, stating, inter alia: “This is a long-standing process about which, to my knowledge, there has been no complaint from the European Commission; Nor have I seen evidence of actual problems faced by minor or protected claimants in obtaining satisfactory benefits under the UtDA that would not have been found in a CPR application against an insured driver” ([111]). The second complaint was that the provision did not provide protection equivalent to that of Part 2.1 of the CPR (Code of Civil Procedure 1998/3132), which provides for the requirement of a friend of the litigant and the obligation for a lawyer to write about the sufficiency of an arbitral award. This proposal was again rejected due to the differences between the UtDA and the CPR, e.B. with the conclusion that “if one compares a claim relating to an unidentified driver to a claim relating to an identified insured driver who would be regulated by the CPP, the differences are quite significant” [110]. However, the following comments in my blog New MIB Untraced Drivers Scheme: Insurers At it Again this agreement was rejected. The cost plan was sent a long time ago, but no payment was made in terms of cost. This is a matter of agreement untraces drivers.

A new agreement was reached between the Minister of Transport and the Bureau of Automobile Insurers on February 28, 2017, taking into account some of my comments on the exclusion of counsel from the proceedings, and effectively came into effect on March 1, 2017 with respect to accidents that occurred on or after that date. Over the past two decades in particular, the MIB has faced requests from scientists to reform their agreements.15 This applies both to the content of the agreements and to compliance with EU law. This article focuses on whether the mib should be required by law, and not just on the content of the agreements. In addition, this article assumes that the mib should not be completely abolished because of its essential role in the Council of Offices and the maintenance of the motor insurance database. Counter-arguments are not at the center of this article. The conclusion makes an important comparison between the United Kingdom and the law in order to examine the potential effectiveness of the proposed reform on the basis of the legislative approach. It is hoped that this analysis will provide a unique and timely overview of these important issues that have long been neglected from the British perspective. In this way, it will draw attention to the need to focus on the shortcomings of the non-statutory system in the UK, which has been subject to little legislative scrutiny or evaluation. The 2003 agreement provided that MIB would calculate the contribution to the costs solely on the basis of the amount of the surcharge. For all claims up to a value of £150,000 (including claims that would have been attributed to the small lane), the costs payable would be calculated at the rate of 15% of the settlement surcharge, subject to a minimum payment of £500 and a maximum of £3,000.

For each claim with an arbitration award of £150,000, the fees payable were calculated at 2% of the amount of the arbitration. This highlights a challenge for the courts, as Hansard is unlikely to aid in judicial interpretation. This remains problematic due to the limitations of the communication available between soSFT and mib. Legislation could therefore ensure greater transparency in the introduction of agreements and facilitate the work of the courts. In addition, it provides applicants and their legal advisers with important information for the interpretation of the agreements. However, it should be noted that the mib provides “guidance notes” for their uda-201557 and UtDA 2017, 58, which can be found on their website. Conversely, these are neither particularly long nor sufficient in terms of the intention behind the introduction of the provisions. Controversies in the past have taken care of the application of mib agreements by third parties who are not parties to the agreements. .