Future Provision of Medical Reports in Road Traffic Accident related personal injury claims
The government is conducting a short, focused consultation to seek views on a revised medical reporting process for unrepresented claimants.
As part of its whiplash reform programme, the government is making changes via the Civil Procedure Rules to increase the small claims track limit for road traffic accident (RTA) related personal injury claims to £5,000.
To support this change, a new IT Platform is being designed to enable unrepresented litigants to progress their own claim irrespective of whether they have legal representation. Decisions are required on a number of issues relating to how unrepresented claimants will in future obtain a medical report. The government is therefore conducting a short, focused consultation to seek views on a revised medical reporting process for unrepresented claimants. In summary, we are seeking views on:
- Expanding MedCo’s remit to cover initial medical reports for all RTA related personal injury claims under £5,000
- Whether to widen the type of medical expert who can be registered on the MedCo system
- Whether to extend the existing fixed cost medical report regime for medical reports
- The procedure for unrepresented claimants to obtain medical evidence
We are interested in hearing from expert stakeholders from the medical reporting sector as well as from claimant lawyers, defendant lawyers, compensators and any other interested parties.