A new Personal Injury Commission is to be established to hear workers compensation and CTP disputes.
Announced by the Minister for Customer Service, Victor Dominello, the new Commission is expected to simplify the dispute resolution system for injured road users and workers who make a compensation claim.
Mr Dominello said the changes were in response to the NSW Parliament Law and Justice Committee’s 2018 review of the workers compensation scheme and 2018 review of the Compulsory Third Party insurance scheme.
Mr Dominello said the new Commission would provide greater alignment of dispute resolution processes across schemes, including in provision of ombudsman and legal aid services.
“Every year in NSW there are over 100,000 people who make a workers compensation or CTP motor accident claim,” Mr Dominello said.
“In establishing a consolidated Personal Injury Commission, we want to reduce complexity and potential ‘process trauma’ for those seeking to dispute an insurer’s decision,” he said.
“We acknowledge that the current dispute resolution process can be improved.”
Mr Dominello said that along with the establishment of a single independent and judicial Commission the Law and Justice Committee’s final report also recommended that the State Insurance Regulatory Authority develop comprehensive criteria to measure insurer performance in the CTP insurance scheme and publicly report this comparative data, on an annual basis.
“We will consult with scheme providers and stakeholders on a model which best achieves this objective,” Mr Dominello said.
