The Alberta authorities is not going to approve auto insurance coverage price will increase for the rest of 2023.
Finance Minster Travis Toews and Affordability and Utilities Minister Matt Jones mentioned in a information launch Thursday the province will even take a look at short- and longer-term measures to get insurance coverage charges in test.
Some price will increase will nonetheless go forward in the event that they have been beforehand authorized or if a driver incurs an at-fault declare or a ticket. Drivers may see will increase in the event that they transfer to a different handle or insure a special car.
The freeze solely applies to non-public passenger autos, the launch mentioned.
The transfer comes a number of years after the UCP authorities determined to not renew the 5 per cent price cap carried out by the earlier NDP authorities.
These caveats prompted NDP finance critic Shannon Phillips to name the announcement a “faux freeze.”
“The UCP lifted the speed cap introduced in by our Alberta NDP authorities and insurance coverage premiums skyrocketed,” she mentioned in a information launch.
“Auto insurance coverage charges went up as a lot as 30 per cent in the course of the pandemic — a time when Albertans have been driving and dealing much less — and the UCP did nothing. “
The pause on insurance coverage will increase reverses what Toews and the UCP authorities has insisted for years — that price caps do not work and solely put a Band-aid on deeper issues.
Toews advised reporters on the Alberta legislature Thursday {that a} short-term freeze is not the identical as a cap.
In December 2019, the federal government introduced the creation of a committee to take a look at the basis causes of the will increase.
The report was made public in October 2020. It beneficial the province abandon its tort system of insurance coverage and transfer to a personal, no-fault mannequin.
Whereas the federal government took motion on a number of smaller, short-term measures, Toews mentioned the federal government would research the extra transformative suggestions.
