BATON ROUGE – It is not the comprehensive package that Republicans had wanted, but after years of effort, Louisiana legislators have passed a bill that they hope will change legal regulations and promote lower auto insurance premiums in the state.
On Monday, the Senate passed House Bill 57, the tort reform package introduced in the House and pushed by Republican House Speaker Clay Schexnayder. After debating amendments to the bill in the Senate, and taking some teeth out of it, the Senate passed the measure in a 29-to-9 vote.
The House rejected Senate amendments; the bill now awaits Senate conference committee action before it goes to the governor.
“The most important goal we have is to facilitate premiums being lowered,” state Sen. Kirk Talbot (R-River Edge), a backer of the bill, told the Louisiana Record.
“Nobody disagrees that the rates are too high. We are all just trying to figure out what we can agree on to get them down,” Talbot said.
Talbot believes that limiting damages in car accident lawsuits will lead to lower auto insurance rates. Talbot’s version of reform legislation, Senate Bill 418 or the Omnibus Premium Reduction Act of 2020, was vetoed by the governor at the beginning of the month. In response to the veto, Schexnayder put together a similar bill in HB 57.
Talbot’s goal with SB 418 was to encourage the use of jury trials and focus accident liability on individuals rather than on insurance companies. It also encouraged settlements by increasing the one-year limit for settlement negotiations.
Health care companies and legislators strongly disagreed on a proposal that was vigorously debated in both chambers called “collateral source.”
Auto insurers say reforming collateral source is critical to getting insurance rates reduced. The collateral source rule prevents a defendant from introducing evidence at trial that a plaintiff has received payment from a third party. So if a person is injured in an accident, and that person has comprehensive medical insurance that pays for his care, his or her attorney would be limited in the additional damages that the injured person could collect. Under the present system, auto insurance companies say damages awarded to an accident victim can be double or even triple the cost to the injured person.
Sen. Heather Cloud (R-Turkey Creek), who managed the bill in the Senate, said afterward that she supported the bill, even though the Senate could not get the collateral source piece to work.
Talbot said the bill was a big step in the right direction after many years of fighting.
“We have finally gotten a legislature that will get a bill to the governor’s desk,” Talbot said. “This is the first time ever that we have gotten something of this magnitude,” Talbot said.
“I hope the governor signs it or we are going to have to step up and do what we have to do,” Talbot said, indicating his willingness to fight for an veto override, if necessary.